Controversial Iowa Rep. Steve King made another eyebrow-raising comment during a town hall gathering in Iowa on Tuesday. “Everyone should eat pork,” King said after discussing alleged abuse of Muslim women in China.
King, 70, told the gathering in Audubon County that he thought China was sterilizing women of Islamic faith in the country and forcing them to eat pork, a meat strictly forbidden in the Muslim faith.
“Congressman Steve King tries to make a joke about China’s alleged treatment of Muslims,” tweeted an editor from political magazine Iowa Starting Line. “He said the Chinese are sterilizing Muslim women and making them eat pork. ‘That’s the only part of that I agree with,’ King said. ‘Everyone should eat pork.'”
Congressman Steve King tries to make a joke about China’s alleged treatment of Muslims. He said the Chinese are sterilizing Muslim women and making them eat pork.
“That’s the only part of that I agree with,” King said. “Everyone should eat pork.” pic.twitter.com/oyEsiq9GBh— Paige Godden (@PaigeGodden) August 27, 2019
King’s comments, which seemed to be making a joke about women he believed were being defiled and abused in China, come just 10 days after he told a group of people in Iowa that he believed rape and incest were largely responsible for much of the world’s population.
“What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled out anyone who was a product of rape or incest?” King, a father of three, wondered while speaking out against abortion. “Would there be any population of the world left if we did that? Considering all the wars and all the rapes and pillages that happened throughout all these different nations, I know that I can’t say that I was not a part of a product of that.”
He later claimed his comments could have been “softer,” but that he stood by the remarks. “I would point out that genealogists have contacted me and said that’s 100% correct,” King said after a week of criticism. “I’d deliver that in a little softer way, though.”
King also said during the town hall, “How long will it take before an entire U.S. congressional district is supplanted by illegal aliens?” Iowa Starting Line editor Paige Godden shared that King alleged such a takeover could happen in six months. “The answer, he said, assuming the average district in the US is about 710,000, is 24 weeks,” she shared on Twitter.
Congressman King poses the question to voters in Audubon: “How long will it take before an entire U.S. congressional district is supplanted by illegal aliens?” The answer, he said, assuming the average district in the US is about 710,000, is 24 weeks.
— Paige Godden (@PaigeGodden) August 27, 2019
King, an avowed, far-right conservative, has a checkered history in terms of making controversial remarks, which eventually resulted in him losing all of his House committee assignments in January. “White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?” he said to the New York Times earlier this year. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell suggested at the time that King “find another line of work.”
King vowed to continue to run for his 10th term in 2020, despite disappearing support and nearly nonexistent funding. When asked whether he might consider retirement in the wake of his controversies, King replied, “No. Unless I’m dead. That’s the only circumstance.”
