Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio is blasting rival Donald Trump on Monday for his refusal to disavow former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke, after the Republican front-runner blamed the incident on a bad earpiece.
“I don’t care how bad the earpiece is, Ku Klux Klan comes through pretty clearly,” Rubio said during a rally in Tennessee.
Trump was asked earlier why he did not disavow the former grand wizard’s endorsement on CNN. The billionaire businessman said he was unable to hear the question due to a bad earpiece.
“I don’t mind disavowing David Duke,” Trump told NBC’s “Today” show. “I disavowed David Duke the day before at a press conference. They were there, CNN was there, and they gave me a lousy earpiece.”
The business mogul was endorsed by the former Klan leader on Thursday.
Ohio governor and fellow presidential candidate John Kasich disavowed White supremacists on CNN Monday when asked about Trump’s response.
“I don’t know what’s in his head,” Kasich told New Day’s Alisyn Camerota. ” All I know is that white supremacist groups have no place in our society and clearly not in the Republican Party.”
Rubio and Trump are in the midst of an escalating war of words, as a result of Rubio’s attacks on Trump during Thursday night’s debate.