NBC's Steve Schmidt Excoriates GOP's "Intellectual Rot" For Empowering Donald Trump

STEVE SCHMIDT: When we look at where this race is today, the presidential race is effectively over. Hillary Rodham Clinton will be the 45th president of the United States. Chuck Schumer will be the majority leader of the United States Senate. And the only question that's still up in the air, is how close the Democrats will come to retaking the House majority.

What this exposes though is much deeper, and goes to the Republican Party as an institution. This candidacy. The magnitude of its disgrace to the country is almost impossible, I think, to articulate. But it has exposed the intellectual rot in the Republican Party. It has exposed at a massive level the hypocrisy, the modern day money changers in the temple like Jerry Falwell Jr. And, so this party to go forward, and to represent a conservative vision for America, has great soul searching to do. And what we have seen in the -- and the danger for all of these candidates -- is over the course the last year, these candidates who have repeatedly put their party ahead of their country, denying what is so obviously clear to anybody who's watching about his complete and total, manifest unfitness for this office.

Previously:

The Reckoning Arrives For Trump, Fox News, And The GOP

Fox's Stirewalt: "Republicans Bought" Trump. "They're Going To Ride It All The Way Down"

CNN's Jim Acosta: Trump's "Deplorable" Comments About Women "Absolutely Can Sink A Campaign"

CNN's Van Jones Challenges Media To Hold Trump Accountable For Attacks On Innocent Central Park Five