MSNBC host Joe Scarborough declared Tuesday morning that he never heard President Trump utter a racist word in the 12 years that they were friends.

Mr. Scarborough, a former Republican and former personal friend of Mr. Trump who now identifies as an independent and routinely criticizes the president, said on “Morning Joe” that he never knew the president to be racist or to use racially charged rhetoric.

“We saw him for 12 years behind closed doors,” Mr. Scarborough said, gesturing to his wife and co-host Mika Brzezinski, according to a clip flagged by Newsbusters.

“Never, ever, once — I’ll say it under oath, I’ll put it into an affidavit — never once heard him say anything close to being racially insensitive,” he told former Trump White House aide Cliff Sims, who was on the show to promote his new tell-all book “Team of Vipers.”

Mr. Scarborough argued that while Mr. Trump is not inherently racist, he’s adopted a public persona that stokes racial fears.

The MSNBC host has made similar comments about the president in the past. In December, he cast doubt on rumors that there is a tape floating around showing Mr. Trump saying the N-word on the set of his former hit TV show “The Apprentice.”

“He did not say racially insensitive things, at least around us, behind closed doors,” Mr. Scarboroughsaid at the time. “In fact, if you just look at the women that he dated and continued to date, it certainly goes against that. The people that he hung out with, the friends that he had, the acquaintances he had in Atlantic City — it certainly would suggest that was not a part of Donald Trump’s personality until he decided in a grotesque way to make it a part of his political persona.”