KC McGinnis/Reuters
Rep. Steve King (R-IA) was reportedly unable to say whether he believes whites are superior to nonwhites when pressed on the issue by an Iowa resident on Tuesday. When asked if he thought “a white society is superior to a nonwhite society,” King dodged the question, according to The New York Times. “I don’t have an answer for that. That’s so hypothetical,” he was quoted as saying. “I’ll say this, America is not a white society—it has never been a completely white society. We came here and joined the Native Americans.” King reportedly continued by saying that people of any color could be “raised to be American as any other” and emphasized that all humans were “created in God’s image.” The woman who asked the question, 63-year-old Mary Lavelle, told the Times she asked King the question out of concern that his rhetoric “resembled” those of the Christchurch shooter. When pressed on this, King reportedly claimed the shooter's views were “inconsistent” and he “mixed and matched ideologies” in his manifesto. “He also likely used the same words that [Chinese leader] Mao [Zedong] used,” King said.