Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence defended Donald Trump Jr.’s anti-refugee Skittles tweet, arguing the media and critics are too clouded by their “outrage” to focus on the issue at hand.
In a Tuesday interview with MSNBC’s Kelly O’Donnell, Pence said the backlash to the tweet, which used an image that has deep roots in white nationalism and Nazi propaganda, surprised him.
“It is remarkable to me to see the level of outrage about a metaphor used by Don Jr. when Hillary Clinton is calling for a 550 percent increase in the Syrian refugee program,” Pence said. “All the while our FBI and public safety officials tell us we can’t know for sure who those people are coming into this country.”
In the same interview, Pence echoed Trump’s call for what the Indiana governor called “common sense” profiling in the wake of this weekend’s apparent terror attacks. He went on to condemn political correctness for getting in the way of police catching terror suspects.
“We simply have to move past this era of political correctness and give our law enforcement community all across this country the tools that they need to be able to do everything in their power, to prevent what happened in Minnesota and in New Jersey and New York from happening on our shores,” he said.
“But talking with law enforcement officers, they’ll tell you that today they feel like they operate in an environment of political correctness, where they can’t use common sense to be able to target resources and target their energies against individuals who would be most likely potential threat to our families and to the safety in our communities,” Pence continued.
Watch clips of the interview below via NBC News’ Frank Thorp:
Pence to @KellyO RE: Skittles:”It’s remarkable to me to see the level of outrage about a metaphor used by Don Jr…” https://t.co/P7cm22G2rv
— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) September 20, 2016
On @MSNBC just now, @KellyO RE: profiling: How would that work?
Mike Pence: “It’s all about common sense…” https://t.co/wCqrhwy4WJ— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) September 20, 2016
