Mike Pence declines to call David Duke 'deplorable'

(Image credit: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images)

last updated 13 September 2016

In an interview Monday with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Mike Pence wouldn't call David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader and ardent Donald Trump supporter, "deplorable."

Trump's running mate was asked about Duke after he criticized Hillary Clinton for comments she made last week about "half of Trump's supporters" being put into what she called "the basket of deplorables." Blitzer brought up Trump receiving the support of Duke and other white nationalists, but Pence said it wasn't the same thing. "I'm not really sure why the media keeps dropping David Duke's name," Pence said, adding, "We don't want his support and we don't want the support of people who think like him." When Blitzer asked if he would call Duke "deplorable," Pence declined, saying that he's not in the "name-calling business, Wolf. You know me better than that." You can watch below. Catherine Garcia

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.