The office of Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) has sought to clarify the senator’s recent comment that the military shouldn’t try to block ideological groups like white nationalists from service.
“Do you believe they should allow white nationalists in the military?” the senator was asked in an interview with WBHM radio.
“Well, they call them that,” Tuberville had said, referring to the Biden administration. “I call them Americans.”
Tuberville, a former college football coach, also argued that the U.S. is “losing in the military” in terms of recruitment “because the Democrats are attacking our military, saying we need to get out the white extremists, the white nationalists, people that don’t believe in our agenda, as Joe Biden’s agenda.”
The senator’s office then said in a statement to AL.com that Tuberville’s quote “shows that he was being skeptical of the notion that there are white nationalists in the military, not that he believes they should be in the military.”
The Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol renewed concerns about white supremacy and other forms of extremism in the military after analysis shortly afterward revealed nearly 1 in 5 people charged in connection with Jan. 6 raid had some form of a military background.
The Defense Department stressed in the Jan. 6 aftermath that the department has “zero tolerance for service members or employees engaged in extremism, white supremacy or who belong to organizations that look to overturn the U.S Constitution.”
Concerns also predate the Biden administration. A Pentagon report requested by Congress and prepared in 2020, during the Trump administration, found that “white supremacy and white nationalism pose a threat to the good order and discipline within the military,” according to the Associated Press.