WATCH: Rick Scott Squirms When Pressed on Trump’s Racist Attack Against Mitch McConnell’s Wife

Florida Senator Rick Scott floundered when asked about former President Donald Trump’s racially-charged attack against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s wife.

Scott spoke to CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday about Florida’s attempts to recover from the devastating impact of Hurricane Ian. After numerous questions about the hurricane response effort, Bash changed topics to bring up how Trump just declared that McConnell “has a DEATH WISH” for supporting bills sponsored by Democrats. The worst invective from the ex-president, however, was directed at Elaine Chao, McConnell’s Asian-American wife and Trump’s own former Secretary of Transportation.

“Must immediately seek help and advise from his China loving wife, Coco Chow!” Trump seethed.

Bash confronted Scott and asked him “are you okay with this” as National Republican Senate Committee chairman. Scott deflected from the question in order to attack Democrats, and he attributed the Chao jab to Trump’s penchant for giving people nicknames.

Well, I can never talk about — why anybody says what they say. The way I looked at it, I think what the president is saying is there’s been a lot of money spent over the last two years. We’ve got to make sure we don’t keep caving to Democrats, causing unbelievable inflation and more and more debt. As you know, the president likes to give people nicknames. You can ask him how he came up with the nickname. I’m sure he has a nickname for me. Here is what I know. We’ve got to watch how we spend our money. We’ve got to stop this inflation and I don’t condone violence and I hope no one else condones violence.

“Nicknames are one thing, but this appears racist,” Bash interjected. “Is that okay?”

“It’s never, ever okay to be racist,” Scott said without pinning this on Trump specifically. “I hope no one is racist, I hope no one says anything inappropriate, so I’m gonna do everything I can.”

Watch above via CNN.