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Donald Trump laughs as Mike Huckabee addresses the crowd at a rally for veterans in Iowa in January. | AP Photo Huckabee: 'Does anybody think Donald Trump is a racist?'

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee defended Donald Trump on Monday, remarking that the GOP front-runner's apparent failure to disavow the Ku Klux Klan and David Duke in an interview the previous day did not reflect any "racist tendencies."

Appearing on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Huckabee was immediately asked if he would disavow Duke and the KKK. The former presidential candidate did so firmly.

“David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan are absolutely abominable. I don’t know anybody that I know, anybody that I’ve ever known, supports them," he said. "And look, I think there’s an incredible just overwhelming fascination I’ve been watching this morning. But look, let me ask you this: Do you think Hillary Clinton is going to have to answer for her relationship with Sen. Robert Byrd who was an actual member of the KKK? Look, I’m not trying to defend, maybe, the inartful way…"

Co-host Joe Scarborough interrupted Huckabee.

“You’re trying to do something, Mike. I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but … This is pretty simple," he explained. "Donald was asked two simple questions, and he didn’t answer them. And there’s no fascination here. I’d just like to hear [Trump] say about the Ku Klux Klan what you just said about the Ku Klux Klan. I don’t think that’s hard. Do you?”

Huckabee responded that Trump has disavowed Duke and the KKK, noting Trump's interview on NBC's "Today" earlier in the hour and his past statements to the effect. For his part, Trump on NBC blamed a faulty earpiece for his failure to completely disavow Duke in that interview Sunday morning on CNN.

"Does anybody think Donald Trump is a racist? I don’t. I mean, I really don’t. I don’t know of anything in his life that indicates that this man has racist tendencies," Huckabee said, brushing off any implication to the contrary while acknowledging that Trump's background as a northerner could make him less perceptible to the deep wounds left by the Klan and Duke in the South.

“Here’s the thing. I doubt he is as sensitive about just how deplorable David Duke is to many of us in the South," Huckabee said. "I think because I’m from the South, I’m more sensitive and frankly more repulsed by racism than maybe people who didn’t grow up here."

Asked whether he feared Trump ripping apart the Republican Party, Huckabee demurred, hitting the Republican National Committee for demanding each candidate sign a pledge to support the party's eventual nominee last year.

“Well here’s what I would be more afraid of. I’d be afraid that it’s the end of the Republican Party not because of Donald Trump but because of people being fed up with the Republican Party that’s so elitist, so snobbish that they demand not just Donald Trump but they demand of me and every other Republican candidate a loyalty to the party," he said. "And if we have an election, that’s how we select presidents, we elect them, we don’t select them, by the party bosses. And if the party bosses don’t get the guy they want, then what are they gonna do? They’re gonna disavow the person the people wanted? If we have to be loyal to the party, Joe, shouldn’t the party be loyal to us?”

Huckabee declined to endorse any candidate on Monday, though he did mention the endorsement of Trump by Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the first sitting senator to back the real-estate mogul's run.

The former Arkansas governor's daughter and former campaign manager, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, has joined the Trump campaign.