Newt Gingrich: Mayors Pander To Black Citizens By Removing Statues

Confederate statues are being taken down in some cities after violence erupted in Charlottesville, Virginia, where white nationalists rallied against the planned removal of a statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee.

But former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), told Fox News host Martha MacCallum Monday that the efforts of the left are taking a “destructive” turn, as he cited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s contention that eliminating Confederate symbols sanitizes history.

Then he got downright offensive.

“I think the point is we ought to be a country focusing on the future, not a country frothing at the mouth about the past,” the author of “Understanding Trump” said in an exchange reported by Media Matters. “And it tells you something about the intellectual collapse of the left ― that all they have is this kind of rabid behavior. And of course, mayors in towns that are largely black are going to pander to their audience. They are going to go out and prove they are popular by doing something that meets the current demagogic needs.”

That’s apparently “every thing that the founding fathers worried about,” according to Gingrich.

“Having demagoguery define your country is truly dangerous,” he said. “Listen to the mob you got on the screen back there. That’s not democracy. That’s not a free society. That’s a group of people behaving like a mob.”

Watch the exchange above.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.