WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell spoke out on Monday against two U.S. Republican lawmakers who appeared at a white nationalist conference last week, making him the latest prominent Republican to rule out any role for racist politics in the party.
“There’s no place in the Republican Party for white supremacists or anti-Semitism,” McConnell said in a statement after being asked by a reporter about the appearances of Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar at a meeting of the America First Political Action Conference.
Greene and Gosar have also come under fire in recent days from Republican Senator Mitt Romney and Representative Liz Cheney.
The controversy underscores the political infighting that has wracked the Republican Party as it attempts to retake majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives in November’s midterm elections.
The conference was organized by white nationalist activist Nicholas Fuentes, who has a history of making anti-Semitic statements.
(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Leslie Adler and Alistair Bell)
