Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) said “white nationalist” is “just a cover word for the Democrats” in an interview with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Monday—doubling down on his previous controversial defense of the extremist group while wrongly insisting they are not inherently racist.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) speaks at a press conference on student loans at the U.S. Capitol on ... [+]
Tuberville made the remarks when Collins asked him to elaborate on his answer to an Alabama radio host’s question in May about whether white nationalists should be allowed to serve in the military: “They call them that. I call them Americans,” he told WBHM radio at the time.
Tuberville downplayed the definition of “white nationalist” in the CNN interview and said Democrats are using the term as “another word they want to use other than racism . . . to try to make people mad across the country.”
“My opinion of a white nationalist, if somebody wants to call them a white nationalist, to me is an American,” Tuberville told Collins, adding that “I am 110% against racism.”
When asked whether he believes white nationalists should be serving in the military, Tuberville wrongly suggested that white nationalism does not equate with racism: “That’s just the name that it’s been given . . . if you’re going to do away with most white people in this country out of the military, we’ve got huge problems.”
According to the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center, supporters of the "white nationalist" ideology are typically white supremacists who call for the creation of a state dominated by white people.
In the May interview, Tuberville accused Democrats of using the terms “white nationalists” and “extremists” to generalize all of the January 6 protesters and criticized Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for ordering a 60-day stand down to combat extremism in the military in the wake of the Capitol riots.
“You think a white nationalist is a Nazi? I don’t look at it like that,” Tuberville told reporters in May when asked to respond to his radio comments. “I look at a white nationalist as a Trump Republican. That’s what we’re called all the time. A MAGA person.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) issued a firm rebuke of Tuberville’s comments in May on the Senate floor, stating “I cannot believe this needs to be said, but white nationalism has no place in our armed forces and no place in any corner of American society, period. Full stop.”
Tuberville spokesperson Steven Stafford, responding to the criticism of his comments in May, said Tuberville made the remarks in defense of anyone serving in the military, stating that he “resents the implication that the people in our military are anything but patriots and heroes.”
Tuberville has repeatedly refused to vote for key military appointments in protest of a Pentagon policy that covers travel costs for members seeking out-of-state abortions. As of Friday, 265 nominations were being held up by Tuberville’s blockade, Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said Monday. The Marine Corps. does not have a leader for the first time since 1859 as Marine Corps. Commandant Gen. David Berger retired Monday and Tuberville has refused to approve his successor, Gen. Eric Smith.
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