Milbank: Trump Cabinet chief sidesteps Trumps shithole talk
This way madness lies.
I knew that Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, when she appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, would deny that Trump said what the whole world knows he said: that he wants immigrants from Norway rather than from shithole countries in Africa.
What I was not expecting was that Nielsen would raise a question about whether Norwegians are mostly white.
Sen. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vermont, displayed a poster from the dais proclaiming, in big letters, Trump: Why allow immigrants from Shithole Countries? An aide held the poster aloft right behind Sen. Richard J. Durbin, D-Illinois, who, along with Sen. Lindsey O. Graham, R-South Carolina, was at the infamous meeting with Trump and told others about his racist language.
Nielsen, who was also in that meeting, was now under oath, and she wiggled every which way to excuse Trump without perjuring herself: I did not hear that word used.
I dont dispute that the president was using tough language.
Leahy moved on to Trumps wish for more Norwegian immigrants. Norway is a predominantly white country, isnt it? he asked, rhetorically.
I actually do not know that, sir, Nielsen replied. But I imagine that is the case.
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