Rep. Cummings calls Steve Bannon a 'white supremacist-type'

On the 49th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rep. Elijah Cummings said Tuesday morning that the famed civil rights icon “would be very disappointed” by the political realities of 2017 and especially by the presence of Steve Bannon — who he described as a 'white supremacist-type' — in the White House.

“In a way he would be pleased to have seen the first African-American elected president, to have seen many doors opened for people like me and others who now have opportunities that would not have had them back then,” Cummings (D-Md.) said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “But at the same time, when we see a guy like Bannon, who is, as far as I'm concerned, a white supremacist-type person, sitting in the White House — sitting in the White House — and I'm paying his salary, I think he would be very disappointed.”


Bannon, who served as the chief executive of the Trump campaign beginning last August and is one of the White House’s top officials, ignited almost immediate controversy when his position within the Trump administration was announced as chief strategist in the days following last year’s presidential election.

His history, most notably as the head of the alt-right website Breitbart News, popular among white nationalist groups, prompted calls for his removal from the White House and have added fuel to the belief in some circles that Trump’s ascension to the presidency was built, in part, with support from hate groups.

Beyond Bannon, Cummings said King would have been disappointed by “all the hate talk that we are hearing now” and by renewed fights over voter suppression, an issue the Maryland lawmaker said he was frustrated to be revisiting. Cummings said he had privately urged both Trump and Vice President Mike Pence to abandon their promised investigation into widespread voter fraud in favor of one into voter suppression.

Trump, who has claimed without evidence that millions of people voted illegally in last year’s election, said those unlawful ballots are the reason he lost the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton.

"As I said to President Trump when I met with him, please stop talking about voter fraud. It does not exist, for all intents and purposes. Concentrate on voter suppression, Mr. President, please,” Cummings said. “You can't do an investigation on voter fraud when it doesn't exist, when you've got people who can't even vote, African-Americans and others. Come on, man. And so, we haven't heard too much more about that voter fraud investigation. I don't know if you noticed that.”

