Tuberville admits ‘white nationalists are racist’ as McConnell, Britt, Schumer condemn CNN remarks

Tuberville admits ‘white nationalists are racist’ as McConnell, Britt, Schumer condemn CNN remarks

A day after doubling down on the idea that white nationalists are “Americans,” not racists, Sen. Tommy Tuberville walked back the remark on Tuesday.

Tuberville’s about-face came after several senators, including his Alabama counterpart, Sen. Katie Britt, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., condemned his comments.

“White nationalists are racists,” Tuberville told reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday.

During an appearance on CNN’s “The Source with Kaitlan Collins” on Monday night, Tuberville called the idea that white nationalists believe white people are superior to other races as “some people’s opinion.”

“If people think that a white nationalist is a racist, I agree with that,” Tuberville responded.

Collins then defined “white nationalist” as “someone who believes that the white race is superior to other races.”

“Well, that’s some people’s opinion,” Tuberville replied.

“That’s not an opinion,” Collins interjected. “What’s your opinion?”

“My opinion of a white nationalist … is an American. Now, if that white nationalist is a racist, I’m totally against anything that they want to do because I am 110 percent against racism,” the senator said.

“But I want somebody that’s in our military that’s strong, that believes in this country,” he continued. “That’s an American that will fight along anybody — whether it’s a man or woman, Black or white, it doesn’t make any difference. And so I’m totally against identity politics I think it’s ruining this country…”

Tuberville first defined white nationalists as Americans in May, when he was asked whether he supports white nationalists in the military.

“They [the Biden administration] call them that,” he told National Public Radio WBHM in Birmingham. “I call them Americans.”

On Tuesday, top lawmakers condemned Tuberville’s remarks.

“White supremacy and racism have absolutely no place in our country. Period. The end,” Britt reportedly said.

McConnell shared that sentiment.

“White supremacy is simply unacceptable in the military and in our whole country,” he said, according to The Hill.

On the Senate floor, Schumer called Tuberville’s comments on CNN “very, very dangerous.”

“The senator from Alabama is wrong, wrong, wrong. The definition of white nationalism is not a matter of opinion,” Schumer said. “White nationalism, the ideology that one race is inherently superior to others, that people of color should be segregated, subjected, and relegated to second class citizenship is racist down to its rotten core.”