Several lawmakers, including civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), said that Tea Party activists at the March 20 rally on Capitol Hill hurled racial and/or homophobic slurs at them. Instead of condemning this behavior, many conservatives have said that they don’t believe these incidents really occurred. However, yesterday, Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) told the Washington Post’s Dave Weigel that he had no doubt that Lewis was telling the truth about the hateful language at the Tea Party rally:
“A couple of weeks before the alleged incident occurred, I was walking across the bridge in Selma, Ala., with John Lewis,” said Pence. “I take at face value what John Lewis said. If John Lewis said he heard it, I believe he’s a man of integrity. And I would denounce those kinds of statements in the strongest possible terms.”
After the rally, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) called the incidents “reprehensible,” but added, “let’s not let a few isolated incidents get in the way of the fact that millions of Americans are scared to death, and millions of Americans want no part of this growing size of government.”