Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) proclaimed on Tuesday night that President Trump is a white supremacist following an exchange with debate moderator Chris Wallace, who asked Trump to condemn white supremacist groups despite the president having repeatedly done so in the past.
“Donald Trump is a white supremacist. People have been warning about this for a long time. They were ridiculed, called hyperbolic & radical – not bc they were wrong, but bc others couldn’t accept that our country elected a supremacist as President,” the New York lawmaker said alongside a clip of the exchange.
“This is fascism at our door,” she added:
During the first presidential debate, Wallace falsely implied that the president never condemned white supremacists despite Trump’s history of doing so repeatedly.
“Racism is evil, and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups,” Trump stated after the clashes in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. Trump also signed a congressional resolution in which he specifically condemned “racism, bigotry and white supremacy.”
Despite that, Wallace challenged Trump to condemn right-wing groups, as the president pointed out that the current bout of violence in the United States has been perpetrated almost entirely by left-wing groups.
The exchange went as follows:
Wallace: You have repeatedly criticized the vice president for not specifically calling out Antifa and other left-wing extremist groups. But are you willing tonight to condemn white supremacists and militia group and to say that they need to stand down and not add to the violence in a number of these cities as we saw in Kenosha and as we’ve seen in Portland?
Trump: Sure, I’m willing to do that.
Wallace: Are you prepared specifically to do it?
Trump: I would say almost everything I see is from the left wing not from the right wing.
Wallace: But what are you saying?
Trump: I’m willing to do anything. I want to see peace.
Wallace: Well, do it, sir.
Biden: Say it, do it, say it.
Trump: What do you want to call them? Give me a name, give me a name, go ahead who do you want me to condemn.
Wallace: White supremacists and right-wing militia.
Trump: Proud Boys, stand back and stand by. But I’ll tell you what somebody’s got to do something about Antifa and the left because this is not a right-wing problem; this is a left wing.
As Breitbart News reported, the transcript clearly shows that the president said “sure” after being asked to condemn white supremacists.
“The ‘stand’ language came from the moderator, and the ‘Proud Boys’ were first brought up by Democratic nominee Joe Biden,” Breitbart News detailed:
Asking him to condemn them (the “again” was never acknowledged) — and refusing to accept Trump’s assurances — was both ill-informed and inflammatory.
Four things are clear from the transcript below:
- Wallace refused to accept “sure” for an answer and demanded Trump (and only Trump) condemn extremists onstage.
- Wallace is the one who introduced the “stand down” language — not Trump, who was doing what he was asked.
- Biden is the one who demanded Trump condemn the “Proud Boys” — a right-wing group — and Trump complied.
- Biden refused to condemn Antifa, saying it was “an idea, not an organization.” Wallace then tried to end the argument.
CNN fell in line, repeating the false narrative by running a headline late Tuesday that read, “Trump refuses to call out white supremacists.”
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