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U.S. NEWSMonday 29 February 2016
White supremacist leader at center of new Trump furor
BILL BARROW Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gestures dur- Tapper. “I don’t know any- The latest shake up in the
THOMAS BEAUMONT ing a speech at a rally in Oklahoma City. Trump is drawing criti- thing about what you’re Republican race comes as
Associated Press cism for refusing to denounce an implicit endorsement from a even talking about with attention shifts to the South,
LEESBURG, Virginia (AP) — white supremacist leader. white supremacy or white with about a half dozen
Republican presidential supremacists.” states in the region holding
front-runner Donald Trump (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki) Trump was asked Friday by contests on Tuesday. Trump
is drawing criticism for refus- journalists how he felt about holds commanding leads
ing to denounce an implicit lowers this week that a vote “Well, just so you under- Duke’s support. He said across the region, with the
endorsement from a white against Trump was equiva- stand, I don’t know any- he didn’t know anything exception of Cruz’s home
supremacist leader, with lent to “treason to your heri- thing about David Duke. about it and curtly said: “All state of Texas, a dynamic
his main rivals, senators Ted tage.” OK?” Trump told host Jake right, I disavow, ok?” that puts tremendous pres-
Cruz and Marco Rubio, us- Trump hasn’t always sure on Rubio and Cruz as
ing the matter to hammer claimed ignorance on they try to outlast each oth-
the billionaire businessman Duke’s history. In 2000, he er and derail Trump.
just two days before mul- wrote a New York Times Campaigning in Virginia,
tiple state primaries could op-ed explaining why he Rubio pounced on Trump’s
put him on an irreversible abandoned the possibil- latest position on Duke,
path to the party’s nomina- ity of running for president shifting to a more serious
tion. on the Reform Party ticket. tone after spending the
Trump was asked Sun- He wrote of an “underside” weekend mocking his ri-
day on CNN’s “State of and “fringe element” of the val’s hair and “the worst
the Union” whether he re- party, concluding, “I leave spray tan in America.”
jected support from David the Reform Party to David “We cannot be a party
Duke, the former Ku Klux Duke, Pat Buchanan and who refuses to condemn
Klan Grand Dragon, and Lenora Fulani. That is not white supremacists and
other white supremacists company I wish to keep.” the Ku Klux Klan,” the Flor-
after Duke told his radio fol- Trump’s comments sparked ida senator told thousands
a wave of censures just of supporters gathered in
ahead of Super Tuesday — Leesburg, Virginia. “Not
March 1 — when 11 states only is that wrong, it makes
hold Republican primaries. him unelectable. How are
At stake are 595 delegates we going to grow the party
to the party’s national con- if we nominate someone
vention this summer, with who doesn’t repudiate the
1,237 needed to win the Ku Klux Klan?”
nomination. Cruz also weighed in on
On the Democratic side, Sunday, calling Trump’s
865 delegates are up for comments “Really sad.”
grabs in Super Tuesday “You’re better than this,”
contests in 11 states and Cruz wrote. “We should all
American Samoa. It takes agree, racism is wrong, KKK
2,383 delegates to gain the is abhorrent.”
Democratic nomination. Democrat Bernie Sand-
Hillary Clinton received an- ers also lashed out at his
other burst of momentum Republican rival on Twit-
after her lopsided victory ter, writing: “America’s first
in South Carolina’s Demo- black president cannot
cratic primary on Saturday, and will not be succeeded
fueled by an 84-16 advan- by a hatemonger who re-
tage among African-Amer- fuses to condemn the KKK.”
icans, a key Democratic Trump also garnered back-
constituency that will also lash Sunday for recently
play a dominant role in sev- retweeting a quote from
eral Super Tuesday states. Benito Mussolini, the 20th
“We got decimated, that’s century fascist dictator of
what happened,” Sand- Italy, which reads: “It is bet-
ers said on ABC, though he ter to live one day as a lion
promised to continue his than 100 years as a sheep.”
campaign against what he Trump told NBC’s “Meet the
describes as a political and Press” on Sunday, “I know
economic oligarchy. who said it. q
