Kellyanne Conway says she’s “pushed back” at former President Donald Trump regarding his increasingly cozy relationship with far-right demagogue Laura Loomer.
During The Atlantic Festival in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, Conway said she’s talked to Trump multiple times regarding her concerns about Loomer and said she has “liked” what she’s heard.
When journalist Tim Alberta asked if Conway, a former senior counselor in the Trump administration, would have let Loomer join Trump on his flight to last week’s presidential debate, she offered a definitive no.
“I don’t know her, I don’t know that I’ve ever been in the same room with her. People have shown me what she has said,” Conway said, adding that she’s not “a big fan of Twitter,” where Loomer is notorious for spewing bigoted and conspiratorial rhetoric.
“I didn’t know this person, so when I learned more about her and what she was saying, including to my 19-year-old daughter — it’s unacceptable,” Conway said, referring to the right-wing agitator’s insults aimed at her daughter Claudia Conway. “And I pushed back on that.”
Loomer has a long record of making racist remarks. She claimed the White House would “smell like curry” if Vice President Kamala Harris — whose mother was an immigrant from India — is elected, and has spread conspiracy theories about 9/11, mass shootings and more. Loomer once referred to Conway’s daughter as a “low IQ, highly sexually promiscuous woman with daddy issues.”
Given Loomer’s well-documented history of stomach-churning comments, Conway told Alberta, “I’ve had a conversation or two with the president since that I won’t reveal, and I liked what I heard.”
And while Conway said she wasn’t thrilled with how Loomer comports herself online, she added that she doesn’t “really care” what the far-right internet personality says.
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“I don’t care what people screaming on social media say, it doesn’t really matter,” Conway added. “It matters to me if they’re anti-this or anti-that, and I know that they don’t reflect the principle.”
Loomer’s proximity to Trump has caused alarm among some of his conservative loyalists. Even right-wing stalwarts like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) have spoken out against Loomer in public.
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