Counselor to President Kellyanne Conway has reversed her position on the term “Kung Flu” from “very offensive” to an acceptable way for President Donald Trump to do the “incredibly important” job of not leaving China out of harm’s way, after the racist. The phrase drew cheers at consecutive campaign rallies.
In March, Conway called the term “hurtful” and “wrong,” noting that she herself was “married to an Asian,” the famous Trump antagonist George Conway, who is of Filipino descent.
She was responding at the time to a tweet from Weijia Jiang of CBS News, alleging that an unidentified White House official used the term against her in person.
Unlikely, Conway attacked that same reporter in a press group on Wednesday for the same claim, telling Jiang that he did not have the “courage” to publicly announce the official.
“I also asked Weijia to reveal to us who said it. I think that would have come a long way,” Conway told an NBC News reporter before suggesting that the person take it with Jiang.
When the journalist pressed on Trump’s use of the term, Conway said “Chinese virus” or “Wuhan virus” were acceptable terms, because they helped Americans understand that the president blamed China for the spread of the pandemic.
This reinforced the topic of conversation for White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany on Monday: that Trump was only “returning responsibility to China.” (He also tried to falsely tell reporters that Trump had not used the term, even though they registered him.)
Conway then turned directly to Jiang.
“I still invite you here to tell us who said that,” she said. “And I think that would be a very important revelation to us. That is not a source for you to protect her. She is someone who shouldn’t have said that, and you’re claiming she said that. And we still don’t know who it was.”
Jiang reminded Conway that she had once said the phrase was “hurtful,” before asking former Trump campaign manager if he would still say that to the president today.
“I speak to the president daily on many different topics,” Conway replied, adding: “We don’t always agree on everything, and that’s why I work here.”
Conway, who was apparently unwilling to let go of the matter, returned to the president’s defense moments later and said “it is incredibly important” that he not “let China escape responsibility.”
Jiang pointed out that “Kung flu” does not refer to any place on the map.
“Excuse me, how do you know how people work? How do you know that people are not anticipating that or connecting it?” Conway replied, assuming a family boxing position.
“You don’t know! Excuse me, while the president says it, he also says that this virus came from China,” he said. “China is responsible!”
When Jiang rejected Conway, the high official blamed her.
“You should have showed up a hundred days ago when you had the chance,” Conway said. “You lost your chance, you lacked the courage to tell everyone who told you that.”
“You like to fan this rather than solve it. I’m here to solve things and not fuel them,” he continued. “You did the opposite on this issue.”
Throughout the contentious exchange, however, Conway was careful never to utter the phrase herself, saying only that it was “another term” among many that Trump has invoked.
“The ‘Wuhan virus,’ the ‘Chinese virus,’ and then he used another term,” Conway said.
