U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Auburn) gave his first sit-down interview since coming under fire from left-wing media over comments he made regarding the issue of crime.
On Tuesday, Lenise Ligon of Mobile-based Fox 10 News asked the senator to clarify his assertion that “pro-crime” Democrats sought “reparation” for offenders of the law during former President Donald Trump’s rally last month in Nevada.
“Well, it had nothing to do with race. Crime has no color,” said Tuberville. “We’ve got crime all over this country. And the people, the taxpayers, deserve safe streets, safe neighborhoods. But my colleagues on the left, for some reason, they won’t come out and speak out against it. Our criminal justice system is out of whack. We don’t put anybody in jail. We don’t hold anybody accountable.
“The people of this country deserve safe streets and safe neighborhoods. And if we don’t get control of it, it’s going to get worse.”
Regarding the NAACP’s call for Alabama’s junior senator to apologize for the remarks, Tuberville insisted he had no reason to express regret due to his comments holding no relation to race.
“I’d apologize if I meant anything about race, but it wasn’t. Like I said, (crime) has no color,” he said. “Reparation would have no color because anybody that does anything wrong that thinks they deserve it, is absolutely wrong in this country. We can’t have a country that chooses winners and losers basically. We have to have people that go by law and order. We’ve had problems the last few years — they’ve been getting worse. And it’s not just petty crimes. It is murder, now we’re having the fentanyl problem, the border — all those things going on.
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“But it had nothing to do with race. Everything had to do with, that came from me, had to do with people doing things the wrong way, breaking the law, but not being held accountable because of the actions of my Democratic colleagues.”
Dylan Smith is the editor of Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @DylanSmithAL