Washington (CNN) 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang again responded to racist comments made by new "Saturday Night Live" hire Shane Gillis, saying he's faced Anti-Asian racism throughout his upbringing but also that "our country has become excessively punitive and vindictive about remarks that people find offensive or racist."

Yang, who is Taiwanese-American, told CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union" Sunday that racial epithets hurt and should be taken seriously, but also softened his criticism, saying Gillis' comments "should be taken differently" because he is a comedian.

"I've experienced a lot of Anti-Asian racism throughout my upbringing. And it hurts. It is something that is very real," he said. "And I do think Anti-Asian racial epithets are not taken as seriously as slurs against other groups. But at the same time, bigger picture, I believe that our country has become excessively punitive and vindictive about remarks that people find offensive or racist and that we need to try and move beyond that if we can, particularly in a case where the person is, in this case to me, like a comedian whose words should be taken in a slightly different light."

Yang's Sunday reaction marks his latest on the comments resurfaced by freelance writer Seth Simons. Simons tweeted a two-minute video clip of Gillis' podcast, 'Matt and Shane's Secret Podcast,' recorded last year in which Gillis says on the video, "Let the f---ing ch--ks live there," of Chinatown. Gillis also mocks a Chinese accent, the language barrier and says, "Chinatown's f---ing nuts."

The video recording of the podcast episode has been deleted from YouTube, and Gillis posted a statement on Twitter Thursday night, saying, "If you go through my 10 years of comedy, most of it bad, you're going to find a lot of bad misses," and adding he's "happy to apologize to anyone who's actually offended by anything I've said. My intention is never to hurt anyone but I am trying to be the best comedian I can be and sometimes that requires risks."

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