Actually, White Nationalists Are Racists, Tuberville Now Says

After significant media scrutiny, Senator Tommy Tuberville has acknowledged the connection between white nationalism and racism.

“White nationalists are racists,” Tuberville told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday afternoon. Although this may appear to be a simple admission, as white nationalists by definition believe that white people are inherently superior, Tuberville had struggled to reach this conclusion.

The Republican from Alabama told CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins on Monday that white nationalism “is just a name that’s been given,” appearing to conflate white supremacist beliefs with simply being white. When Collins informed Tuberville that “a white nationalist is a racist,” Tuberville replied: “Well, that’s your opinion.”

On Tuesday morning, Tuberville said “I’m totally against racism,” but indicated that he did not see the connection between white nationalism and racism.

“If Democrats want to say that white nationalists are racist, I’m totally against that too,” Tuberville told ABC News’ Rachel Scott. When Scott pressed him on whether he believed white nationalists are racist, Tuberville responded: “Yes, if that’s what a racist is, yes.”

On Tuesday, Democrats slammed Tuberville for his comments, with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer calling on the Alabama Republican to apologize. “No, he needs to apologize,” Tuberville responded.

Senator Raphael Warnock also called on Tuberville to apologize and “change course.” He told reporters: “White nationalism is racism, by definition. It’s not a matter of opinion. And for the senator to play games with this is dangerous.”

Meanwhile, other Republican senators reiterated that they think racism and white nationalism are bad.

“White supremacy and racism have absolutely no place in our country, period,” Senator Katie Britt, Tuberville’s colleague from Alabama, told reporters. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday that “white supremacy is simply unacceptable in our military and in our entire country.”

This was not Tuberville’s first time obscuring the connection between white nationalism and racism. In May, he said that he believed white nationalists should not be prevented from serving in the military.

“I call them Americans,” Tuberville said then, arguing that military readiness in the U.S. was lacking because “Democrats are attacking our military, saying we need to get out the white extremists, the white nationalists, people that don’t believe in our agenda.”

Senator Tommy Tuberville can’t—or won’t—wrap his mind around the fact that white nationalism is inherently racist.

The Alabama Republican has insisted multiple times in recent months, including twice in the past 24 hours, that while racism is bad, white nationalists are not racist. The Southern Poverty Law Center defines white nationalists as groups that “espouse white supremacist or white separatist ideologies, often focusing on the alleged inferiority of nonwhite persons. Their primary goal is to create a white ethnostate.” So it’s pretty clearly an ideology based on racism.

White nationalist “is just a name that’s been given,” Tuberville told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Monday night, seemingly intentionally conflating being white and being a white nationalist. “So if you’re going to do away with most white people in this country out of the military, we’ve got huge problems.”

People have different beliefs, and “if racism is one of those beliefs, I am totally against it,” Tuberville said.

When Collins told him that that was what white nationalism entailed, Tuberville said, “Well, that’s your opinion.”

When ABC reporter Rachel Scott pressed him on the matter Tuesday morning, Tuberville doubled down, insisting the racism element was simply one definition of white nationalism, but not the definition.

Even more frightening than Tuberville’s seemingly deliberate obtuseness, though, is why he is defending white nationalists: He believes they should be allowed to serve in the military. In May, the senator said white nationalists should be allowed in the U.S. military because blocking any ideological group from serving would weaken the institution. Tuberville also referred to the military as a “strong, hard-nosed, killing machine,” which could possibly explain why he thinks extremists belong in the armed forces.

But if we’re talking about a weakened military, Tuberville should look in the mirror. Marine Corps Commandant David Berger stepped down Monday, leaving the corps leaderless for the first time in more than a century. His replacement has been nominated but not yet confirmed because Tuberville has blocked hundreds of military promotions since March in objection to the Defense Department’s abortion policy. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has warned Tuberville’s blockade “harms America’s national security” and poses a “clear risk” to the military’s readiness.

The QAnon Shaman is not happy about sharing the spotlight with Nick Fuentes.

College Republicans United, a group whose hallmark values include “opposition to immigration and multiculturalism,” and spreading “Christian Nationalism across the country,” is hosting its national convention later this month. And the antisemitic and white nationalist Fuentes is set to headline the event alongside Jake Chansley, who earned more of his notoriety as the QAnon Shaman after rioting at the Capitol on January 6.

Chansley apparently “was not aware” that he’d be “sharing the stage with someone who wants a 16-year-old wife”—and he’s now apparently taking the supposed surprise as a challenge to “expose” Fuentes as a “false prophet.”

Hours after expressing his incredulity, Chansley confirmed he will attend the conference to “show these college republicans what a REAL alpha male looks & sounds like”:

Fuentes has indeed expressed his desire for a 16-year-old child bride—when he turns 30 years old. But even beyond that, Fuentes has racked up quite a record. He was previously banned from social media outlets for violent rhetoric about people of color, women, Jewish people, immigrants, LGBTQ people, Covid-19, and much more. He has also proudly said he’s “just like Hitler” (whom he has also called “a pedophile … also really fucking cool”), and that “Catholic monarchy, and just war, and crusades, and inquisitions” are much better than democracy.

Chansley meanwhile has long been active in trying to spread the QAnon conspiracy theory. After the 2020 election, he focused his efforts on challenging the election results, specifically in Arizona, culminating in his participation in the January 6 attack on the Capitol (and in a photo of him with his fist raised as he stood on the dais on the Senate floor).

Meanwhile, the original venue for the conference, the Hassayampa Inn, has announced that the “event will no longer be held” there anymore. Now, the College Republicans United website ambiguously says the conference will be held in downtown Prescott, Arizona. “This year’s convention promises to be bigger, better, and more impactful than ever before,” the organization assures, noting that the actual location will be “made public July 28th.”

The event will include other members of the far right—including neo-Nazi streamer “Baked Alaska” and a former Arizona Representative expelled from the state House. It was originally set to include other since-delisted speakers, like former Arizona Representative David Stringer, who resigned after refusing to cooperate with an ethics investigation into previous charges against him for paying two boys under the age of 15—one who was developmentally disabled—$10 each to have sex with him.

Out of all that, though, Chansley’s discomfort with the event is focused primarily on Fuentes. May the Alpha Male games begin!

This article has been updated.

The federal prosecutor investigating Hunter Biden’s taxes hit back at Republican claims that the Justice Department had blocked the probe.

The president’s much-embattled son agreed to a plea deal in June that will see him plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges of tax evasion and participate in a pretrial program for a gun offense. Hunter will avoid jail time under the deal, which was negotiated with Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss and has infuriated Republicans.

Shortly before the deal was struck, an IRS agent accused Weiss—a Trump appointee—and Justice Department officials of dragging their feet on investigating Hunter Biden. In particular, the agent, Gary Shapley, alleged Weiss said in October that Weiss did not have final say on whether charges would be filed.

Shapley also claims Weiss said he had been blocked from pursuing charges in D.C.—where Hunter supposedly committed his most serious crimes—and that the Justice Department would not grant him special counsel status, which would have let him bring charges outside his jurisdiction. Republicans have jumped on Shapley’s claims as proof that the Hunter Biden investigation did not go far enough.

Weiss hit back at those claims Monday evening in a letter to Senator Lindsey Graham. “To clarify an apparent misperception and to avoid future confusion, I wish to make one point clear: in this case, I have not requested Special Counsel designation,” Weiss wrote.

He explained that he would have been granted that status “if it proved necessary,” although he did not say who ultimately decided that it did not. Weiss also said he had “never been denied the authority to bring charges in any jurisdiction.”

Weiss had previously smacked down Shapley’s claims in a letter to House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan. Republicans have seized on Shapley’s accusations as part of their sprawling and evidence-less investigations into the Biden family’s alleged corruption.

Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson understands that 9/11 was not great, and that it’s not awesome that Saudi Arabia killed an American resident and journalist.… But dang it, he just loves golf too much to not give Saudi Arabia at least a little slack!

“Well listen, I have the deepest sympathy for 9/11 families, I understand the issue of sportswashing, I don’t think there’s any—there’s not enough billions of dollars for the Saudis to wash away the stain of the brutal Khashoggi murder,” Johnson began. “But the reality is we all buy oil, we use—we drive cars, we are the ones that are filling up the coffers of the Public Investment Fund,” he added, referring to the Saudi government-controlled wealth fund that backs LIV Golf.

“I would rather have the Saudis invest their oil wealth in the U.S. as opposed to China or Russia—that’s just a reality of the world,” he continued. “And again, I’m a lover of the game of golf. I love watching golf. I want to see the best golfers in the world compete against each other and not be split into different leagues and pretty well destroy the competition at the highest level.”

According to Johnson, it is a bigger shame that some of the best golfers in the world might not be in the same league, than, you know ... everything else.

Johnson’s comments come while the Saudi-backed LIV Golf League—which last month reached an agreement to merge with the North American PGA Tour—is under heightened scrutiny.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Permanent Investigations is hosting a hearing on the merger Tuesday; the hearing comes just one day after the league announced that it will host its $50 million championship at Donald Trump’s National Doral Golf Club for the second year in a row.

That kind of money is top of mind for Johnson, who wonders what we would want Saudi Arabia to do with all that cash instead, if not buying out teams and leagues left and right in a massive sportswashing campaign: