At his campaign rally in Houston this week President Trump declared that he is a nationalist, and you would think he’d called Democrats “deplorables,” or something.

As soon as I heard the forbidden word, I knew the liberal media would call 911. You’d think they’d have more pride than to allow Trump to pull their chains so easily, but like conditioned hound dogs, they started barking their indignant condemnations.

“It is a favorite of the ‘alt-right’ and is loaded with nativist and racial undertones,” groused CNN’s Don Lemon. Lemon’s rabid colleague, Jim Acosta, directly confronted the president, saying, “There is a concern that you are sending coded language, or a dog whistle to some Americans out there, that what you really mean is you’re a white nationalist.”

Not to be outdone, MSNBC Host Nicolle Wallace said President Trump’s self-reference as a nationalist was not a “silent” dog whistle because he was being outspoken about being a nationalist and even doubling down on it. “Do you think he knows some of the great nationalists of all-time included Hitler?” she asked her guests. “Do you think he has any idea the history of World War II or Nazism that it came from a call for nationalism?”

Likewise, MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell said that Trump “knows that in America the word ‘nationalist’ usually follows the word what? White nationalist.’ … When Donald Trump uses that word, he wants you to hear it as racist… That is Donald Trump’s way of saying: ‘I am a white nationalist.’”

Why don’t Lemon, Acosta, Wallace, O’Donnell, and the rest of the Trump-hating cabal quit hiding behind the pretext that “other people” are drawing these despicable inferences? They’re the ones spreading this inflammatory bile. They don’t even talk to people on the street like reporters of old. They just wallow alone in their own toxic echo chamber.

Trump denied the charges, saying, “I’ve never heard that theory about being a nationalist. … and I am a nationalist. It’s a word that hasn’t been used too much. I think it should be brought back.”

Knowing exactly how the media would react to Trump’s utterance, I considered what he meant and shared my opinion on Twitter: “My honest take: Trump believes in a strong, exceptional America. He’s not a political scientist. He doesn’t speak in code. When he says, ‘I’m a nationalist,’ he’s not winking at Neo-Nazis. He’s saying, ‘I’m a patriot and you PC people can’t make me quit using the word, ‘nationalist.’”

For two years leftists have demonized Trump as a dark-hearted, alt-right, white supremacist hell-bent on returning America to the days of Jim Crow. They paint Trump’s unapologetic, America-first patriotism, especially his hardline stance on illegal immigration, as a thinly disguised racist manifesto.

Nonsense. Yes, Trump may occasionally bait malcontent journalists, but he’s usually straightforward to a fault. He was simply conveying that he’s a super-patriot who is determined to restore America’s strength and prosperity.

The smear that Trump is sending racist code to his base only makes sense if his supporters themselves are racists. Why else would they respond to such an abominable message?

But make no mistake – the liberal media and other Trump haters want the rest of America to believe that Trump-supporting conservatives are racists who long for a white America. We don’t think in such sick terms.

These malicious attacks on Trump must be seen for what they are: an indictment of his millions of supporters. The left has long tarred Republicans as racists but now that Trump is at the helm of the party, they are more brazen about it.

Trump supporters are not racists, but they are proud of their country and are sick of politicians, universities, and Hollywood denigrating and apologizing for it, undermining its sovereignty and rule of law, and promoting policies that weaken it. Additionally, it’s inconceivable that Trump would deliberately open himself up to yet another bogus charge of racism and alienate minority voters at the very time he’s trying to woo them through his policies and messaging.

The virtue-signaling liberal press don’t get it. Trump supporters don’t need to be prodded to vote. They’re already plenty energized by the positive direction in which America is moving under Trump’s leadership and their certainty that the Kavanaugh-slandering, open borders Democrats would slam it into reverse if they are restored to power.