“Montanans,” Sen. Daines tweeted, “are sick and tired of listening to anti-American, anti-Semitic radical Democrats trash our country and our ideals.”

Senator Daines, that piece of bluster and deflection is beneath you and the United States Senate seat you hold.

You had a chance to take a courageous stand last week against the President’s racist and unacceptable language. As a Republican senator, your voice would have carried some weight. It could have set an example.

But instead you decided to double down on hate.

Trashing the country and our ideals? Can you really look any Montanan in the eye and say that’s not precisely what the race-baiting of President Trump has done? How is it okay to tell four elected U.S. congresswomen, three of them born in this country, to “go back” to the “crime-infested places from which they came”? You are personally too intelligent not to understand precisely why that crosses every line.

Are you so political that you would rather pander to your base than acknowledge the truth?

The four congresswomen have certainly said things we disagree with. But nothing they have said justifies the invective from the President, or from you.

Every person of color in Montana can tell you they’ve heard the “go back” racist trope from time to time in their lives. Many would tell you that their parents and grandparents heard it too.

They’ve just never heard it from the Oval Office, directed disgracefully at U.S. Representatives.

The state’s rabbis have called you out in an open letter on the use of “anti-Semitic,” saying that you are playing into white nationalism.

Further, we do not believe that anybody in Congress deserves to be labeled “anti-American.” That compounds the President’s insult. It is absolutely McCarthyesque.

Montanans, Senator Daines, do not believe in McCarthyism.

Maybe you should hold some real town halls, not just controllable “tele-town halls” and orchestrated meetings with supporters, because we believe this response shows you’re distressingly out of touch with real Montana values.

We are disappointed.