An advisor to former Ku Klux Klan and Louisiana State Rep. David Duke confirmed that he personally invited House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) to speak at a white nationalist event in 2002.
“He was my neighbor,” Duke’s advisor Kenny Knight told the Washington Post’s Robert Costa. “I asked him to be the first speaker before the meeting kicked off.”
Scalise came under fire this week after reports surfaced that he spoke at an event hosted by the European-American Unity and Rights Organization (EURO), a group founded by Duke (pictured above).
Scalise claims he did not realize that the organization was a hate group and said that at the time he was speaking for “any group that called.”
Knight defended Scalise’s decision to attend the event he organized for Duke.
“As part of that, I decided to ask Steve, our local representative, to come by and say a few words before the conference started,” he told the Post. “He agreed, believing it was going to be neighbors, friends, and family. He saw me not as David Duke’s guy, but as the president of our civic association.”
Scalise and Knight were neighbors in Louisiana. Knight said, “Steve was someone who I exchanged ideas with on politics. We wouldn’t talk about race or the Jewish question.”
Though Knight said he thought Scalise considered him a neighbor, he acknowledged that he had to be aware of Knight’s political views.
“Now, at the time, I was a prominent person in state politics. I was on the radio, I was doing campaigns,” Knight said. “Steve knew who I was, but I don’t think he held it against me. He knew I lived by his street and that I was active in our community.”
But Knight insisted that Scalise did not fully understand the nature of EURO and did not agree with Duke on race, and Scalise spoke at the beginning of the event, never seeing Duke’s appearance.
Duke told the Post on Monday that he did not know Scalise well and did not remember the then-state representative attending the convention.
“Scalise would communicate a lot with my campaign manager, Kenny Knight,” Duke said. “That is why he was invited and why he would come. Kenny knew Scalise, Scalise knew Kenny. They were friendly.”
