White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany Denies Trump Supports The Confederate Flag

by Polina KuznetsovaJuly 8, 2020, 3:48 pm2020 Candidates, Daily Digest, News, News Feed >

White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said President Donald Trump did not have an opinion about the Confederate flag.

McEnany dismissed reporters’ questions about a Trump tweet, in which the president said without evidence that NASCAR’s decision to ban Confederate flag resulted in the “lowest ratings ever.” Meanwhile, Fox Sports executive Michael Mulvihill has tweeted that NASCAR viewership has actually increased to 8% since its return from coronavirus break on May 17.

When repeatedly asked to elaborate on Trump’s tweet, McEnany did not address the question directly, moving on to talk about the NASCAR’s investigation on a noose found in black driver Bubba Wallace‘s garage.

“Well I think you’re mischaracterizing the tweet,” McEnany said. “The tweet was aimed at pointing out that the FBI report of the alleged hate crime at NASCAR concluded that the garage-door pull, which had been there since last fall, was obviously not targeted at a specific individual because, in fact, it was a garage pull and, in fact, it was there since last fall long before these 43 teams arrived.”

After a reporter asked her to comment on Trump’s stance on the Confederate flag, McEnany claimed the president did not have an opinion on the matter.

“He’s not given an opinion one way or the other on that,” she said. “I just spoke to him this morning.”

A Bloomberg reporter then asked why Trump would not “praise” the ban of Confederate flag, McEnany again moved away from addressing president’s stance on the flag and instead criticized the removal of Confederate monuments across the country, calling it “cancel culture.”

“What we’re seeing across the nation is this vast cancel culture where we’re going to tear down our monuments. We’re going to tear down Gandhi. We’re going to tear down George Washington. We’re going to tear down Lincoln,” McEnany said. “It’s really quite appalling … and the president wants no part in cancel culture.”