GOP presidential primary front-runner Donald Trump used an interview on “The Savage Nation” radio show on Tuesday to again disavow the KKK.
The fracas started Sunday when Trump was interviewed by CNN’s Jake Tapper, and the news agency reported the candidate “declined to disavow support from David Duke, the former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, claiming he didn’t know anything about the group.”
Trump later explained he didn’t hear the question because of a “bad earpiece.”
And he pointed out that he had previously denounced the Klan.
At the beginning of his radio show Tuesday, Michael Savage asked: “Donald, I want to put something to rest. I know you are the least racist person of all of the candidates. I know it from your employees. I know it from your history, but you’ve also been smeared continuously with this KKK garbage. And I know you’ve denounced it. Can you clearly say that you denounce this endorsement on ‘The Savage Nation’?”
Trump replied: “Yeah. Totally denounce, and I disavowed it, and I’ve disavowed it numerous times, and I’ve disavowed it on Twitter, and on Facebook, and all over the place but people refuse to accept it.”
Responded Savage, “Donald, I accept it because I know your history.”
Nevertheless, CNN reported House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., entered the KKK controversy.
“If a person wants to be the nominee of the Republican Party, there can be no evasion and no games. They must reject any group or cause that is built on bigotry. This party does not prey on people’s prejudices,” Ryan told Capitol Hill reporters.
Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell stated, “Senate Republicans condemn David Duke, the KKK, and his racism.”
Democrats, meanwhile, were claiming Trump’s views were the same as those of his party.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, R-Calif, said: “The leading Republican presidential candidate’s refusal to disavow the KKK was a breathtaking low point for our country. Yet while Donald Trump’s radical agenda does not reflect the values of the American people, it is a perfect reflection of many in the House Republican Conference.”
Hear Michael Savage and Donald Trump:
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The dustup even prompted the resurrection of claims about Trump’s father being involved in a KKK event in 1927.
The New York Times said its own pages included a report of a Fred Trump being discharged by police at a KKK rally in Queens.
The Times said it asked “about police arresting a Fred Trump who lived at that Devonshire address in 1927.”
Trump said it was a false report.
The left-leaning fact checker Snopes said, “While it’s possible the elder Trump attended the event along with KKK supporters and Klansmen, it’s also possible he was minding his own business in his own neighborhood, and found himself in the middle of an enormous brawl.”
Fox News reported Tuesday that Trump had asked, “How many times do I have to continue to disavow people?”
WND reported last week that Savage said Trump is winning because he’s pushing the ideas that Savage himself has been bringing to the American public for years already.
In a monologue last week, Savage, heard by 10 million listeners a week and syndicated in more than 300 markets, said “The Savage Nation” has now “risen to national prominence through the victories of Donald Trump.”
“For 21 years my message has been borders, language, culture,” Savage told his listeners. “My last three to four books, if you look at them … my solutions for saving America. Many of these bullet points or talking points have been and are being used by the Trump campaign, to the credit of Donald Trump, and, of course, to the benefit of the United States of America.
“And I’m going to take credit, not for getting out the vote, I certainly wouldn’t take credit for that, but for being the architect of Trump’s messaging.”
See the WND Superstore’s stock of Michael Savage’s products.
Listen to Michael Savage’s comments:
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Savage, the recipient of the “Freedom of Speech Award” from Talkers Magazine, famously is the only member of the U.S. media ever blacklisted and banned from a Western nation.
As WND reported, in 2009 Britain put Savage on a list of 16 people banned from entry because the government believed their views might provoke violence. But the U.K. never specified which statements it found to be dangerous.
Savage holds a master’s degree in medical botany and a second in medical anthropology. His Ph.D. is from the University of California at Berkeley in epidemiology and nutrition sciences.
