Rubio, a first-term US senator from Florida who is seen by some Republican leaders as the best hope to defeat Trump, said on Monday, “I don’t care how bad the earpiece is – Ku Klux Klan comes through pretty clearly and he refuses to criticize it”.
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When he was asked if he would unequivocally condemn Duke and reject his and the KKK’s support, Trump told CNN’s Jake Tapper: “Just so you understand, I don’t know anything about David Duke. OK?”
“Well just so you understanding, I don’t know anything about David Duke, or anything about what you’re even talking about with White Supremacy or White Supremacists”, Trump replied.
Cruz says he’s the only one who can beat Trump, and the Texas senator is making this appeal to voters: “I would encourage you, even if you like another candidate, stand with us if you don’t want Donald to be the nominee”.
“If you look at it, I disavowed David Duke all weekend long – on Facebook, on Twitter, but obviously it’s never enough”, he said. “What I heard was ‘various groups.’ And I don’t mind disavowing anybody, and I disavowed David Duke”.
Presidential hopeful Donald Trump has come under fire for refusing to condemn an endorsement from a former Ku Klux Klan leader. We should all agree, racism is wrong, KKK is abhorrent’.
Trump has so far won states of South Carolina, Nevada, and New Hampshire in primary votes, while finishing second in Iowa.
This morning on the Today Show, Trump claimed that he was the victim of a faulty earpiece.
According to the news station, the real estate mogul was asked three times whether he would like to disavow his support from white supremacist groups.
Tapper: I’m just talking about David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan here. “I said, ‘Do me a favor and tell me the groups.’ He was unable to tell me them”. Not only is that wrong, it makes him unelectable’.
Historian and Washington-based The Atlantic journalist Yoni Applebaum posted an archived excerpt of a newspaper which alleged that in 1927, one of a large group of rioting Klansmen in Queens was Fred Trump.
When asked by Fox News why he bothered to bring up the judge’s ethnicity, Trump blamed it on the television host, Chris Wallace.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders also lashed out, writing on Twitter “America’s first black president can not and will not be succeeded by a hatemonger who refuses to condemn the KKK”.
In January, a white nationalist super PAC paid for a pro-Trump robocall to Iowa voters that said, “We don’t need Muslims”.
The former 2016 candidate also shrugged off questions about how Trump would accomplish his campaign promises, particularly border wall that the businessman has repeatedly said he would force Mexico to pay for.
Make no mistake: Neither of these comments will adversely affect Trump in the upcoming Super Tuesday primaries and caucuses.
Cruz tells CBS’ “Face the Nation” that “there is no doubt that if Donald steamrolls through Super Tuesday, wins everywhere with big margins, that he may well be unstoppable”.
“We’re not angry people, but we’re angry at the way this country’s being run (and) angry at the way the Republican Party is being run”.
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The 11 states holding Democratic nominating contests Tuesday will send 18% of the delegates to July’s nominating convention in Philadelphia.
