Michael Steele is calling out the CPAC communication director Ian Walters for saying he was just a racial hire.
Here’s video of what he said:
WATCH: At the Ronald Reagan Dinner at CPAC, ACU Communications Director Ian Walters said the RNC hired Michael Steele as chairman in 2009 "because he’s a black guy." pic.twitter.com/g6YcyLET5w
— NBC News (@NBCNews) February 24, 2018
And Steele was standing in the back of the room when he said that.
Ugh. So stupid. Steele isn’t my favorite guy but it’s dumb to say the only reason he was hired was because of his race.
“I wanted to talk to (CPAC chairman) Matt Schlapp first, but I think it’s painfully stupid what he said,” Steele said. “If he feels that way, I’d like him to come say that to my face. And then I’d like him to look at my record and see what I did.”
He later addressed the remark again on MSNBC.
“We have allowed this element to have a voice, we have given countenance to it, we have given it the space to express itself,” he said. “There is no taking that back. You can’t deny that that has been freed up.”
He said Walters felt comfortable making the remark during the dinner because “you think everyone in that room is going to be in agreement with you.”
Yeah I doubt that idiot Matt Schlapp would have helped – he probably wrote the line for him.