Paul Nehlen, a Republican who is gearing up for another primary challenge to House Speaker Paul Ryan, retreated to a live stream hosted by alt-right flunk-out Tim Gionet, aka “Baked Alaska,” after provoking widespread outrage with an anti-Semitic tweet.
Nehlen joined Gionet on Tuesday to air his grievances over being labeled an anti-Semite after he posted a list of verified Twitter users who criticized him whom he believed to be Jewish. Nehlen has also dedicated a page on his campaign website to encourage the harassment of private citizens who criticize him.
Vincent James, a frequent talking head on the alt-right YouTube channel “Red Elephants”, also joined the stream. As the blog Angry White Men reports, James recently encouraged the harassment of a Louisiana high school teacher whom he claimed was “anti-white” and “Marxist,” which resulted in a short ban from YouTube. James now claims to have plans for more targeted harassment.
During the interview, Nehlen claimed that a series of tweets he posted last week was an effort to expose the “Jewish media.”
“In this series of tweets that I put out a week ago showed, in fact, that five of these organizations—and I could have done 10, clearly—are over-represented by Jewish folks,” Nehlen said. “And I figured I’ll let other people make the decision about was ‘Jewish media’ an appropriate observation?’”
Nehlen used an analogy about basketball to further explain his thinking.
“If you and I were talking and I said to you something to the effect of, ‘Well, you know, NBA basketball teams are over-represented by blacks,’ and you said, ‘Wait a minute, you can’t say that,’ and I showed you pictures of five NBA basketball teams—predominantly black when the population is only 13 percent black—and you said, ‘Hey, you’re a racist for pointing that out,’ well, I’m not a racist for pointing out observationally correct, factual information,” Nehlen said.
Later in the interview, Nehlen also defended his appearance on the anti-Semitic podcast “Fash the Nation.”
“Who in their right mind wouldn’t go everywhere they’re asked when you’re running for office,” Nehlen said. “And you know, I need donations.”
