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Rep. Steve King (R-IA) appeared on CNN this morning and answered questions about his white supremacist tweet from yesterday. Asked by Chris Cuomo what he meant, King answered that he means exactly what he said:

Watch courtesy of CNN:

My interview with Rep. Steve King https://t.co/uuoLkRR1Q6 — Christopher C. Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) March 13, 2017

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The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) captured King’s comments:

Rep. Steve King stood by his explicitly white nationalist comments on CNN today pic.twitter.com/wTYdsGOP7z — SPLC (@splcenter) March 13, 2017

King might have been bemused then, by efforts already underway to portray Steve Kings comments as somehow positive:

Believe it or not tho, in context, King was fumbling to make a positive point: encouraging interracial marriage+generational "melting pot." — Jeff B/DDHQ (@EsotericCD) March 13, 2017

Clearly, not at all what King said in his original tweet, which was not about an interracial melting pot, but rather the opposite. Because, for King, Western Civilization is not about ideals of individual freedom and democracy, but about skin color.

Appallingly, King seems to think values are genetic as if in lacking Anglo-Saxon genetic material you cannot be a lover of freedom.

Soledad O’Brien, for one, wasn’t buying it, tweeting:

This is an interesting interpretation. https://t.co/6pWsLliTDv — Soledad O'Brien (@soledadobrien) March 13, 2017

Yes. Interesting would be one word for it. Appalling dishonest would be another way to say it.

Others were pointing to the fact that not only are King’s words racist but they are inaccurate:

Beyond being prototypically racist, King's remarks are inaccurate. Immigration growth necessary to maintain population growth/tax base. — Noah Rothman (@NoahCRothman) March 13, 2017

And in fact, there was no need to sugar coat King’s words because while others were making excuses for him, he was standing by his racism, and much of the GOP with him.