A White House speechwriter who addressed a conference attended by white supremacists no longer works for the Trump administration, according to reports Sunday.
Darren Beattie spoke at the 2016 H.L. Mencken Club Conference, an annual gathering catering to right-leaning academics that well-known white nationalists, including Richard Spencer, have attended.
CNN’s KFile reported Sunday that the White House ask that the Beattie story be put on hold for several days last week and declined to reveal when exactly he parted ways with the administration. “Mr. Beattie no longer works at the White House,” White House spokesman Hogan Gidley told CNN on Friday night after multiple inquiries into Beattie’s appearance at the event. “We don’t comment on personnel matters.”
In a follow-up report, the Washington Post said Beattie had initially refused to resign after White House officials urged him to step down when CNN reached out about its forthcoming report, prompting his dismissal.
Meanwhile, Beattie, a former visiting instructor at Duke University, has stood by the appearance he made at the event.
“In 2016 I attended the Mencken conference in question and delivered a stand-alone, academic talk titled ‘The Intelligentsia and the Right.’ I said nothing objectionable and stand by my remarks completely,” he told CNN in a Saturday email.
“It was the honor of my life to serve in the Trump Administration. I love President Trump, who is a fearless American hero, and continue to support him one hundred percent. I have no further comment,” he added.
