Howard Dean on Northam Blackface Photo: ‘Republicans Have No Morals At All’
The topic of VA Gov. Ralph Northam (D) and the yearbook blackface photo came up a lot on Sunday morning talk shows. Amid nearly across-the-board calls for resignation came much praise for Northam, and former Gov. and DNC chair Howard Dean joined that praise on CNN’s Reliable Sources. But he also had condemnation.
Not for Northam, though; Dean’s condemnation was for the Republicans who are criticizing the governor.
“I don’t know Ralph Northam,” Dean began. “I believe he’s a decent person but I think he has to resign.”
He repeated the same essential argument made earlier on CNN by former governor of Virginia Terry McAuliffe that the problem is his ability to govern going forward. “I don’t see — he just can’t be effective as a governor after something like this,” said Dean.
He said there are “parallels” to former Senator Al Franken resigning over sexual harassment allegations, who Dean called “a very decent, smart senator.”
Host Brian Stelter said that he noticed Dean had retweeted something from Obama-era health care administrator Andy Slavitt who said that “if you’ve worn blackface or repeatedly said President Obama was born in Africa you should resign.”
“The point here is clear, it’s a remark about President Trump’s own racist history,” said Stelter. “Do you see a double standard at play, Howard?”
“Sure there is, among the Republicans,” said Dean. “You know, they have no morals at all. I mean, you know, Republicans are happy to ask Ralph Northam to resign, They have a much worse guy who is heading their party. It’s ridiculous.”
After a quiet pause in the panel, Dean continued. “This is not — this is very similar to the Kavanaugh appointment, who got appointed with all, with nothing but Republican votes. They don’t care about this kind of stuff because their base doesn’t care about this kind of stuff.”
“I think if there was a photo of Kavanaugh looking like this, it would have been different, said Stelter. “But I’ll leave that at that.”
“It might have been,” said Dean.
Watch the clip above, courtesy of CNN.
[Featured image via screengrab]
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