Mitch McConnell did some damage control after receiving backlash over his comments on Black voters.
The Republican Senate leader sparked outrage Wednesday, when he was pressed about a sweeping election bill that he and other GOP members are working to defeat. A reporter specifically asked McConnell to address the growing concerns about racial minorities, who believe their voting rights will be jeopardized if the bill is ultimately squashed.
“The concern is misplaced because if you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans,” he said. “Ninety-four percent of Americans thought it was easy to vote. This is not a problem.”
McConnell was immediately slammed for the answer, which implied Black voters were not real Americans. The Kentucky lawmaker addressed the controversy during a Friday night press conference, saying the criticism was an “outrageous characterization of my history and record on voting rights and race relations.”
“This outrageous characterization of my record as a result of leaving one word out inadvertently the other day, which I just now have supplied to you, is deeply offensive,” McConnell said, before noting he had attended the signing of the 1965 Voting Rights Act as well as Martin Luther King Jr.’s march on Washington, D.C.
He went on to tell the crowd that he mistakenly left out the word “almost” in his original comments; however, he returned to the microphone shortly after to over more clarification: “The omitted word is ‘all,’ not ‘almost,’” he explained. “Sorry.”
