2:20
Other presidential hopefuls refrained from hitting Biden directly but made clear that they did not agree with his views.
\"I'm not here to criticize other Democrats, but it's never ok to celebrate segregationists. Never,\" Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said Wednesday avoiding mentioning Biden by name.
Former Maryland Rep. John Delaney was similarly reflective, saying, \"Evoking an avowed segregationist is not the best way to make the point that we need to work together and is insensitive; we need to learn from history but we also need to be aggressive in dismantling structural racism that exists today.\"
Symone Sanders, a senior adviser for the Biden campaign, defended the former vice president's comments, making it clear the vice president was not praising Eastland and Talmadge and calling the insinuation he did \"disingenuous.\"
.@JoeBiden did not praise a segregationist. That is a disingenuous take. He basically said sometimes in Congress, one has to work with terrible or down right racist folks to get things done. And then went on to say when you can't work with them, work around them.
— Symone D. Sanders (@SymoneDSanders) June 19, 2019
\"@JoeBiden did not praise a segregationist. That is a disingenuous take. He basically said sometimes in Congress, one has to work with terrible or downright racist folks to get things done. And then went on to say when you can't work with them, work around them,\" Sanders tweeted Wednesday afternoon.
\"Joe Biden has been an ally in the fight for civil rights for years. I am all here for VALID CRITICISM, but suggesting that Joe Biden -- the man who literally ran for office against an incumbent at 29 because of the civil rights movement, the man who was at the forefront of marriage equality before it was politically popular, the man who served as President Obama's VP, the man who literally launched his 2020 campaign calling out Nazis in Charlottesville along with Trump's equivalency -- suggesting he is actively praising a segregationist is just a bad take and a willfully disingenuous act,\" Sanders continued.
House Majority Whip James Clyburn, of South Carolina, a senior member of the Congressional Black Caucus and the highest ranking black lawmaker, defended Biden in comments to Politico saying that the business of governance sometimes requires working with people with distasteful views. Biden is one of 22 candidates expected to attend Clyburn's famous fish fry before the South Carolina Democratic Convention -- a must-stop event on the campaign trail in a state with a high number of black voters.
\"I worked with Strom Thurmond all my life,\" Clyburn said of Thurmond, who was known for his staunch segregationist views. \"You don't have to agree with people to work with them.\"
ABC's Mariam Kahn contributed to this report
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