Republican Rep. Mike Bost from Illinois said Thursday his use of the term “Orientals” in a statement about why he wouldn’t be attending town halls was a “poor choice of words” and detracted from the overall point he wanted to make.
Bost used the term in a meeting last week with The Southern Illinoisan’s editorial board: “The amount of time I have at home is minimal,” Bost said. “I need to make sure that it’s productive. You know the cleansing that the Orientals used to do where you’d put one person out in front and 900 people yell at them? That’s not what we need.”
Bost later told CNN “there was no malicious intent” to his words and that they “may have distracted from an important point.”
He continued, “When the booing and shouting drowns out the conversation we’re trying to have with our constituents, it becomes that much harder to govern.”
Bost voted last year in favor of a bill that stopped lawmakers from using the terms “Oriental” and “Negro” in legislation, which was signed by then-President Barack Obama.
Twitter wasn’t thrilled with Bost’s choice of words.
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