White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders: “To my experience, I’ve never heard him say anything like that, or similar to that specifically.” | Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo White House: Focus should be on immigration policy, not vulgarity

The country has “wasted” five days fighting over President Donald Trump’s alleged “shithole” remark instead of focusing on the actual immigration debate, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday.

She acknowledged that the president isn’t always politically correct in his discussions of issues.


“Look, I wasn’t in that room, so I can only go off the individuals who were,” she said during the White House press briefing. “They said that term wasn’t used, but that tough language was. Look, no one here is going to pretend like the president is always politically correct. He isn’t. I think that’s one of the reasons the American people love him. One of the reasons that he won and is sitting in the Oval Office today is he isn’t a scripted robot. He tells things like they are sometimes, and sometimes he does use tough language.”

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On Thursday, Trump was reported to have referred to African nations as “shithole” countries during a private meeting with lawmakers about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. Trump has since denied using that exact phrase but said he did use “tough” language.

Instead of focusing on that particular comment, Sanders said, Democrats should focus more on the individuals they’re looking to protect through immigration negotiations.

“The point that he’s trying to make, the point is that, frankly, the entire conversation should be focused on the issue at hand,” she added. “We’ve wasted five days fighting over one word when we should be fighting over the people that are involved in the DACA program. If Democrats really want to protect these individuals, that’s who they should be fighting for, and that’s who they should be fighting about.”

Sanders added that she had never personally heard Trump make that sort of comment.

“To my experience, I’ve never heard him say anything like that, or similar to that specifically,” she said, adding: “I’ve never heard him make a reference to that so certainly can’t speak to anything beyond that at this point.”

