Washington CNN —
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was asked on Tuesday about how he hadn’t yet condemned former President Donald Trump for having dinner a week ago with Nick Fuentes, a White nationalist and Holocaust denier.
McCarthy said, “I don’t think anybody should be spending any time with Nick Fuentes. He has no place in this Republican Party. I think President Trump came out four times and condemned him, and didn’t know who he was.”
A reporter responded: “Well, he just said he didn’t know who he was. He didn’t condemn him or his ideology.”
McCarthy then said, “Well, I condemn his ideology. It has no place in society. At all.”
But the reporter was correct about Trump.
Facts First: McCarthy’s claim was false: Trump had not condemned Fuentes at the time McCarthy spoke. Trump had made at least four statements about the dinner, saying each time that he had not known Fuentes, but none of these statements included a denunciation of Fuentes.
In yet another statement, published by Fox more than five hours after McCarthy made his comments on Tuesday, Trump said that Fuentes hadn’t expressed his views at the dinner and that if Fuentes had, “it wouldn’t have been accepted.” This was the closest Trump has come to condemning Fuentes.
Here’s what Trump has actually said in his public statements about the dinner, which took place at his Mar-a-Lago resort and residence in Florida last Tuesday.
Fuentes attended the dinner with rapper Kanye...
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