Joe Biden on Wednesday evoked liberal hero Ted Kennedy to explain that his relationships with segregationist senators in the 1970s were adversarial, not cordial, as he had suggested the day before.

The former vice president had been dogged throughout the day with questions about his remarks at a Manhattan fundraiser Tuesday night, where he waxed nostalgically about his early Senate career’s legislative partnerships with the likes of Democratic Sens. James O. Eastland and Herman Talmadge. Both were staunch segregationists who opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and virtually all other civil rights measures.