Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) declared on this week’s broadcast of “Fox News Sunday” that the Republican Party had taken a “hateful” and “divisive” turn.

Partial transcript as follows:

JOE BIDEN: This MAGA crowd is really the most extreme political organization that’s existed in American history — in recent American history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BAIER: Do you agree with that statement and that effort politically? I mean, it has echoes of categorizing a whole bunch of people a certain way.

MURPHY: I mean, I am very concerned about the sort of very quick, hateful, divisive turn that the Republican Party has taken. This effort in Florida to sort of target gay kids in schools, I just think is mean-spirited and something that I had not seen from the Republican Party when I first started out in politics 20 years ago.

BAIER: I’m going to interrupt you.

MURPHY: Yeah.

BAIER: To target gay kids in schools? I mean, the bill is about not talking about sexual identity from K through 3rd grade. That’s not targeting gay kids.

MURPHY: Yes, it is, it’s absolutely is. It is sending a message to these kids that they are not worthy, that they should be shamed of their identification.

(CROSSTALK)

BAIER: No, it says — it says, Senator, but you don’t teach subjects with gender identity.

MURPHY: You don’t think that those kids don’t —

BAIER: Don’t the parents have a right —

MURPHY: You don’t think that those kids don’t take a message from a — from a ban on the discussion of their identity suggests that they are not worthy of existence in that school. Half of the kids —

(CROSSTALK)

BAIER: Senator, do you talk to your kindergartner about sexual identity?

MURPHY: Half of kids — of trans kids in this country have contemplated suicide and that’s because of the effort to bully them for their identity by adults in this country.

BAIER: Senator —

MURPHY: So I absolutely do think that there’s a message sent to these kids when you — when you suggest that a conversation about their identity is somehow threatening the education of kids in our schools.

BAIER: With your children, did you talk about sexual identity as a kindergarten — kindergartener? I mean, you don’t talk about the birds and the bees, let alone the birds and the birds at that age. Kindergartener through third grade.

MURPHY: So, there was an amendment and the Florida legislature to ban sexual education in the early ages. That amendment failed because this wasn’t about trying to protect children from a discussion about sex. This was an effort to specifically ban a conversation about topics related to sexual identity.

BAIER: You were making a point that you think it’s gone too far. I was saying half the country identified at least with that movement, the policies of the make America Great Again Movement, and you think that that’s a good, winning thing for the president to be doing politically heading into the midterms?

MURPHY: Again, I just have seen this turn in the Republican Party where they are not willing to support protections for our democracy. They’re willing to install a president in the White House who didn’t actually win either the popular or the electoral vote. They seem to be targeting vulnerable kids in a way that they didn’t 10 or 20 years ago. I do think it’s important to sort of talk about this very different element of the Republican Party that exists today that I don’t think was the foundation of the party a couple decades ago.

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN