{"id":197359,"date":"2019-01-11T23:04:05","date_gmt":"2019-01-12T04:04:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=197359"},"modified":"2019-01-11T23:04:05","modified_gmt":"2019-01-12T04:04:05","slug":"gop-senator-rep-kings-white-supremacy-remarks-hurt-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/01\/11\/gop-senator-rep-kings-white-supremacy-remarks-hurt-nation\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP senator: Rep. King’s white supremacy remarks hurt nation"},"content":{"rendered":"
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King, in his ninth House term, spoke as key members of his party publicly took issue with his remarks and as a Republican from back home lined up to challenge him in a GOP primary. (File Photo<\/a>: Congressman Steve King\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 Iowa Republican congressman Steve King says he’s not a racist, but he faced intensifying criticism Friday over his remarks about white supremacy, including from a black GOP senator who said such comments are a blight on the nation and the party.<\/p>\n

For the second time in two days, King insisted that he is an advocate for \u201cWestern civilization,\u201d not white supremacy or white nationalism. But he didn’t deny remarks published a day earlier in The New York Times in which he was quoted saying: \u201cWhite nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization \u2014 how did that language become offensive?\u201d<\/p>\n

Within hours Thursday, the House’s top three Republicans condemned his remarks, and on Friday, GOP Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina published his disapproval in an op-ed column.<\/p>\n

King, who has denied being racist, appeared on the House floor after most lawmakers had left town.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne phrase in that long article has created an unnecessary controversy. That was my mistake,\u201d King told his colleagues. King said terms describing bigotry, such as racism, are unfairly applied to \u201cotherwise innocent\u201d people.<\/p>\n

King, in his ninth House term, spoke as key members of his party publicly took issue with his remarks and as a Republican from back home lined up to challenge him in a GOP primary.<\/p>\n

Scott, who is black, cast King’s remarks and those like them as a blemish on the country and the Republican Party, which has long had a frosty relationship with black voters.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people with opinions similar to King’s open their mouths, they damage not only the Republican Party and the conservative brand but also our nation as a whole,\u201d Scott wrote.<\/p>\n

King’s views, Scott added, are separate from the conservative movement and \u201cshould be ridiculed at every turn possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSome in our party wonder why Republicans are constantly accused of racism \u2014 it is because of our silence when things like this are said,\u201d Scott wrote.<\/p>\n

In fact, House Republican leaders swiftly condemned King’s remarks as racist. And on Wednesday, King drew a 2020 primary challenger: Randy Feenstra, a GOP state senator.<\/p>\n

Some Democrats have called for the House to condemn King’s remarks or somehow punish him. Speaker Nancy Pelosi acknowledged Friday there was \u201cinterest\u201d in taking action \u2014 but no decision to do so, or how.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’ll see what we do about Steve King,\u201d she told reporters. \u201cNothing is shocking anymore, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

King’s position in the GOP had been imperiled even before this week.<\/p>\n

In 2017, he tweeted: \u201cWe can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.\u201d Then he doubled down on CNN, telling the network, \u201cI’d like to see an America that’s just so homogeneous that we look a lot the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shortly before the 2018 midterm elections, in which King was running, Rep. Steve Stivers, R-Ohio, then the head of the GOP campaign committee, issued an extraordinary public denunciation of him.<\/p>\n

King on Friday suggested he’s been misunderstood. He said the foundation of the Times interview was partly a Sept. 12 tweet in which he wrote: \u201c’Nazi’ is injected into Leftist talking points because the worn out & exhausted \u201cracist\u201d is over used & applied to everyone who lacks melanin & who fail to virtue signal at the requisite frequency & decibels. But…Nazis were socialists & Leftists are socialists.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Friday, King said on the House floor that the interview \u201calso was discussion of other terms that have been used, almost always unjustly labeling otherwise innocent people. The word racist, the word Nazi, the word fascist, the phrase white nationalists, the phrase white supremacists.\u201d<\/p>\n

King said he was only wondering aloud: \u201cHow did that offensive language get injected into our political dialogue? Who does that, how does it get done, how do they get by with laying labels like this on people?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

Associated Press writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 Iowa Republican congressman Steve King says he’s not a racist, but he faced intensifying criticism Friday over his …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":187803,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-197359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-laurie-kellman","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}