CPAC Official Says Ex-Republican Chief Was Chosen Because He’s ‘a Black Guy’

Michael Steele, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said on Saturday that the party has a problem with racism after a spokesman for a conservative group said Steele was chosen as chairman because he is “a black guy.”

The spokesman, Ian B. Walters, made the comment on Friday night at a dinner in Oxon Hill, Maryland, that was part of the annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

“We elected Mike Steele to be the RNC chair because he’s a black guy,” said Walters, the communications director for the American Conservative Union, which organized the conference. “That was the wrong thing to do.”

There were audible gasps when Walters made the comment, Jonathan Levine, the media editor at The Wrap, who was at the dinner, said on Twitter.

Steele was the first black chairman of the Republican National Committee, serving from 2009 to 2011. His tenure coincided with the election of Barack Obama as the first black president.

Walters said Republicans were “somewhat lost” after the election of Obama and “weren’t sure what to do,” leading to Steele’s selection as chairman.

Speaking with Joy-Ann Reid of MSNBC on Friday night, Steele, a former lieutenant governor of Maryland and the first black person elected to statewide office there, said he did not accept an apology from Walters.

“He said at one point, ‘I apologize,’ Steele said, adding that he told Walters, “That’s not enough.”

Walters apologized on Twitter on Friday night. “I spoke with Mike Steele and apologized because the words I used do not capture my heart,” he wrote.

He added: “Sometimes when you speak, the words that come out do not reflect what’s intended. Many of us were critics of how Chairman Steele performed at the RNC. He is a good man, and he did his best.”

In a phone interview on Saturday morning on Reid’s show, Steele was asked if the Republican Party had a problem with racism.

“Yes, they do. And I think we need to be honest and acknowledge it,” Steele said. “The fact that people sit here now and say this has nothing to do with race — yeah, it does, when you stand on a podium and blatantly speak to race the way Ian did.”

Walters did not respond to a request for comment on Saturday.

Michael Ahrens, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, said in a statement, “We reject the offensive comments made” on Friday night.

Black people made up 2 percent of registered Republican voters in 2016, according to the Pew Research Center, the same percentage as in 1992. President Donald Trump received 8 percent of the black vote in 2016.

Steele, speaking Saturday on his show on SiriusXM radio with Matt Schlapp, the chairman of the American Conservative Union, said comments like Miller’s “undermine” efforts to “expand this party and its reach into communities of color across the country.”

Schlapp apologized to Steele and said Walters’ comments were “unfortunate words” that might have been based on Steele’s criticism of the “Trump phenomena.”

Steele has been critical of Trump’s racially tinged comments about Haiti and some African nations. Steele also said that Trump’s suggestion that armed teachers would help prevent school shootings was “desperate and delusional.”

On Saturday, Schlapp urged Steele “to have some grace,” which angered the host.

“Wait a minute,” Steele said. “What the hell do I have to be graceful for?”

He added: “It is stupid to sit there and say we elected a black man chairman of the party and that was a mistake. Do you know how that sounds to the black community? Do you know how that sounds to Americans?”