A white nationalist and former Donald Trump delegate explained in an interview this week that the billionaire businessman is best suited to represent “all peoples,” most especially white people.
“Mr. Trump is the real deal,” Los Angeles-based attorney William Johnson said Wednesday in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper. “He does not govern — he will not govern by public opinion poll. He says what’s on his mind.”
He added later in reference to his white nationalist positions, “I believe that Western civilization is declining and dying out in every country around the world that has traditionally been white. Europe is being replaced by immigrants from Africa. America — the same thing happening here.”
“And so I believe that we need to be aware of this precipitous decline in the white race, and I think it’s good for people to be proud of your heritage, whatever heritage that might be,” he added, “but particularly for white people because the whites now are so afraid to be proud of their heritage because they’re called bad names if they are.”
Johnson was selected momentarily to be one of the Trump campaign’s delegates in California.
However, after Mother Jones reported that Johnson is also the chairman of the white nationalist American Freedom Party, which seeks to preserve and protect white language and culture, the Trump campaign dropped him.
A campaign spokesperson told the Washington Post that he had been selected as a delegate due to a “database error.”
Johnson confirmed Wednesday that the Trump campaign had distanced itself from him, and clarified further that he resigned from the position.
Asked to explain if he really believes that white America is in decline and Trump is the man to save it, Johnson said, “I’m saying that we are being dispossessed, but I have not attributed it to the other races.”
“I do believe that when you replace one people with another, that is not a good thing, whether it takes place in Mongolia or in Sweden. I think that Donald Trump has to be a president for all peoples. That’s what all the presidents must do,” he added. “It is up to me as an advocate for the white group to push our agenda more than any other agenda. That’s my responsibility. His responsibility is to lead the entire country.”
Johnson was involved in the 2016 GOP primary earlier this year when he sent out pro-Trump robo-calls warning of Cuban-Americans Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas.
“The white race is dying out in America and Europe because we are afraid to be called racists,” Johnson said in the recorded telephone message. “Donald Trump is not a racist, but Donald Trump is not afraid. Don’t vote for a Cuban, vote for Donald Trump.”
Questions about white nationalist support for Trump have dogged the businessman’s campaign since February, when former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke threw his support behind the real estate mogul.
“Voting for these people, voting against Donald Trump at this point, is really treason to your heritage,” Duke said on his radio show. “I’m not saying I endorse everything about Trump. In fact, I haven’t formally endorsed him. But I do support his candidacy, and I support voting for him as a strategic action. I hope he does everything we hope he will do.” He also encouraged his listeners to volunteer for Trump.
Later, in an interview with CNN, Trump declined to disavow Duke, claiming he was unfamiliar with the former KKK head.
“I don’t anything about David Duke, OK? I don’t even know anything about what you’re talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists,” he said.
Trump backtracked later, and said he couldn’t understand Tapper, blaming a “lousy earpiece.”
