The California Republican Party has rescinded its endorsement of Northern California candidate Ted Howze over his old writings on social media. In posts to Facebook and Twitter, Howze called the Prophet Muhammad a pedophile and Islam a “death cult,” derided the Parkland shooting survivors, and described Democratic California representative Maxine Waters as “hitting the crack pipe too hard.” He deleted them after Politico reported them. Howze is challenging Democratic Representative Josh Harder for a seat representing California’ 10th congressional district. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy rebuffed Howze’s remarks: “Bigotry and hateful rhetoric—in any form—have no place in the Republican Party. These posts are unacceptable.” Howze responded on Twitter: “The maliciously false attacks on our campaign based on old social media posts being attributed to me are #FakeNews.”