Louisiana’s sole Democrat in Congress, Rep. Troy Carter, defended his GOP counterpart Steve Scalise Thursday after a fellow House Republican repeated left-wing claims that he had attended a white supremacist conference in the past and called himself “David Duke without the baggage.”
Carter (D-La.), a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, stated that he’s never witnessed Scalise (R-La.) exhibit racial intolerance.
“Earlier today I was asked if Congressman Scalise was racist. I’ve known the man for 25 years and we have stark ideological differences. We have often agreed to disagree,” Carter, 59, posted on X, formerly Twitter.
“In that time, however, I have never seen him display racial intolerance. I count him amongst my friends and I wouldn’t if I felt otherwise.”
Carter’s statement followed an incendiary interview Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) gave to CNN Wednesday evening in which she outlined her reasons against voting Scalise, the current House majority leader, to replace Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as speaker.
“I personally cannot, in good conscience, vote for someone who attended a white supremacist conference and compared himself to David Duke,” Mace told “The Lead” host Jake Tapper.
“I would be doing an enormous disservice to the voters that I represent in South Carolina if I were to do that.”
Back in 2002, Scalise spoke at a conference hosted by the European-American Unity and Rights Organization, a group founded by notorious neo-Nazi and former Klu Klux Klan leader David Duke.
Scalise admitted in 2014 that he attended the event to speak about taxes, but insisted he wasn’t aware of what the group’s leaders stood for, describing it as a “mistake I regret.”
An associate of Duke, Kenny Knight, claimed that Scalise spoke to individuals unaffiliated with the group before the conference, but “was not there as a guest speaker,” Slate reported at the time.
A Louisiana political reporter later claimed that the Republican lawmaker dubbed himself “David Duke without the baggage,” the New York Times reported the following January.
“I think he meant he supported the same policy ideas as David Duke, but he wasn’t David Duke, that he didn’t have the same feelings about certain people as David Duke did,” the reporter, Stephanie Grace, recounted to the outlet.
However, there has been no corroboration that Scalise ever made the remark.
Scalise, 58, is undergoing treatment for blood cancer and previously survived an assassination attempt at a 2017 Congressional Baseball Game practice.
Mace joined seven other GOP renegades in deposing former McCarthy Oct. 3
Since then, House Republicans have scrambled to replace him as the lower chamber stands paralyzed.
The South Carolina lawmaker backed Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) for the speakership and told Tapper she would vote for him on the House floor.
Mace has downplayed accusations that Jordan turned a blind eye while a wrestling coach at Ohio State University to sexual molestation and abuse of athletes by a university doctor. Jordan has denied knowledge of the doctor’s activities.
Scalise edged Jordan 113-99 in a closed-door Republican conference vote Wednesday, but has been unable to lock down the 217 votes he will likely need to clinch the gavel.
Mace has exhibited a penchant for attention-grabbing stunts during the speakership saga.
On Tuesday, she donned a t-shirt with a blood red “A” emblazoned on it en route to a speakership candidate forum.
“I am wearing the scarlet letter after the week I had last week, being a woman up here and being demonized for my vote and my voice,” she told reporters, referencing Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic novel “The Scarlet Letter.”
Until the House elects a speaker, it cannot conduct other business.
The task before Republicans has been given new urgency by the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, dwindling funds for Ukraine aid, and a looming partial government shutdown on Nov. 17.