Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) accused black students of supporting “segregation” in a tweet reacting to an article from 2016 detailing requests for “safe spaces” at universities and colleges.
King accused black students of supporting “Governor George Wallace’s segregation” instead of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s message of racial harmony and equality.
“Black Students Demand Segregation: Black students are trading Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s integration in for Governor George Wallace’s segregation…a societal degradation,” the lawmaker wrote on Monday.
{mosads}King highlighted an article on the right-leaning college website The College Fix from January 2016 titled “Black students demand segregated spaces from white students.”
The report noted demands from minority student groups from various colleges and universities around the country that were compiled by a now-defunct web site, TheDemands.org.
It included a request for an “Afrikan Diaspora floor” at UCLA and a “safe space” for “Africana identifying students” at Oberlin University.
Conservatives have called such requests from minority students akin to segregationist policies.
King himself has a history of racially charged comments and controversial remarks on immigration and diversity. Last year, the Iowa lawmaker was sharply criticized, including by African-American members of his own party, for claiming that “diversity” is not a quality from which America draws strength.
“Diversity is not our strength. Assimilation has become a dirty word to the multiculturalist Left. Assimilation, not diversity, is our American strength,” he tweeted in December.