The former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke announced on Monday that he is running for a US Senate seat in Louisiana.
In a video, the former KKK grand wizard said, “I’m proud to announce my candidacy for the United States Senate.”
“I believe in equal rights for all and respect for all Americans. However, what makes me different is I also demand respect for the rights and heritage of European Americans.” He added that he was “overjoyed” to see the Republican nominee for president, Donald Trump, embrace his ideas.
“I’m overjoyed to see Donald Trump and most Americans embrace most of the issues that I’ve championed for years” said Duke, a white supremacist who has backed Trump’s presidency in recent months.
“We must stop the massive immigration and ethnic cleansing of the people whose forefathers created America. I was the first major candidate in modern times to promote the term and policy of ‘America First’,” Duke said in the video.
Trump’s campaign has adopted “America First” as a slogan. First used before the second world war, by speakers including Charles Lindbergh, the slogan took on isolationist and antisemitic connotations. Trump also declared himself to be the candidate of “law and order”, a conscious echo of the divisive campaign rhetoric used by Richard Nixon in 1968.
On Thursday night, Duke tweeted his support for Trump’s speech to the Republican national convention in Cleveland, saying: “Great Trump Speech, America First! Stop Wars! Defeat the Corrupt elites! Protect our Borders! Fair Trade! Couldn’t have said it better!”
In the midst of the Republican primary election in February, Trump ran into controversy when he did not immediately disavow statements of support from Duke.
“I don’t know anything about David Duke,” he said in an interview on CNN. “I don’t know anything about what you’re even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists.
“So I don’t know. I don’t know – did he endorse me, or what’s going on? Because I know nothing about David Duke; I know nothing about white supremacists.”
He added: “Certainly I would disavow it if I thought there was something wrong.”
Trump subsequently used Twitter to say: “As I stated at the press conference on Friday regarding David Duke – I disavow.” His delay in doing so, however, had caused considerable consternation.
In his video released on Friday, Duke also echoed Trump’s idea of taking the country back from “special interests”.
“A revolution is coming in the United States of America, for the real people, the vast majority of the American people,” he said.
Duke’s announcement came as the state is grappling with deep racial tensions after the shooting death of a black man by white police officers and the killing of three law enforcement officers by a black man in Baton Rouge.
A registered Republican, Duke would be seeking an open seat vacated by Republican David Vitter, who decide not to run for re-election on the 8 November ballot. Nearly two dozen candidates have signed up for the Senate race. Duke has not yet filed the official paperwork to run. Louisiana’s candidate qualifying period ends on Friday afternoon.
Duke is a former state representative who represented suburban New Orleans for one term more than two decades ago and was an unsuccessful candidate for Congress. Duke is also a convicted felon, who pleaded guilty in 2002 to bilking his supporters and cheating on his taxes. He spent a year in federal prison, but later denied any wrongdoing.
Roger Villere, chairman of the Republican party of Louisiana, denounced Duke’s candidacy in a statement.
“The Republican Party opposes, in the strongest possible terms, David Duke’s candidacy for any public office. David Duke is a convicted felon and a hate-filled fraud who does not embody the values of the Republican Party,” Villere said on Friday.
In a statement to the Guardian, Matt Beynon, the communications director for US representative John Fleming, also a candidate in the Senate primary, said: “Dr Fleming has always rejected all forms of racism, discrimination and prejudice. He is wholly focused on uniting Louisiana voters of all races, creeds and religions behind his hopeful message of freedom, liberty and security.”
Fleming and fellow congressman Charles Boustany are leading contenders for the seat vacated by Vitter.
