Republican, and former speaker of the house, during the Clinton presidency, Newt Gingrich -- has a history of making bigoted and offensive statements. Below is a sample:

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Newt Gingrich: Obama is engaged in "Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior." On September 12, Gingrich reportedly told National Review Online that Obama has pretended to be "normal" but actually seems to be engaged in "Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior": [ READ MORE ]

Gingrich compares Islamic center to Nazis erecting a sign near Holocaust Museum and to a Japanese site near Pearl Harbor.

On the August 16 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, Newt Gingrich said, "Nazis don't have the right to put up a sign next to the Holocaust Museum in Washington. We would never accept the Japanese putting up a site next to Pearl Harbor. There's no reason for us to accept a mosque next to the World Trade Center."

Gingrich smears Sotomayor as a "racist." ABC's Jake Tapper and Huma Khan reported on May 27, 2009, that Gingrich had written on Twitter: "Imagine a judicial nominee said 'my experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman' new racism is no better than old racism" and "White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw. Latina woman racist should also withdraw." Gingrich later said that he didn't know whether Sotomayor herself was a racist, but her quote about a wise Latina was "clearly racist."

Newt Gingrich: Bilingual education teaches "the language of living in a ghetto." An April 1, 2007, Associated Press article reported that Gingrich described bilingual education as teaching "the language of living in a ghetto" and mocked requirements that ballots be printed in multiple languages:

"The government should quit mandating that various documents be printed in any one of 700 languages depending on who randomly shows up" to vote, Gingrich said. The former Georgia congressman, who is considering seeking the GOP presidential nomination in 2008, made the comments in a speech to the National Federation of Republican Women.

"The American people believe English should be the official language of the government. . . . We should replace bilingual education with immersion in English so people learn the common language of the country and they learn the language of prosperity, not the language of living in a ghetto," Gingrich said, drawing cheers from the crowd of more than 100.

"Citizenship requires passing a test on American history in English. If that's true, then we do not have to create ballots in any language except English," he said.


The AP article further reported that in 1995 Gingrich said that bilingualism poses "long-term dangers to the fabric of our nation" and that "allowing bilingualism to continue to grow is very dangerous."

Newt Gingrich: Poor blacks fail to acquire wealth partly because of their "habits." A June 16, 1995, Washington Post article reported that Gingrich, in a discussion with black journalists, stated that the failure of poor black people to acquire wealth was in part due to their "habits." From the Post article:

He acknowledged that it was more "difficult to acquire wealth as a black in America," but added that more than skin color is at play. "The truth is that preachers and lawyers have been more dominant in the black culture in the last 40 years than have business people," said Gingrich. "The habits of the church and the habits of the lawsuit have been more powerful than the habits of acquisition and the habits of job creation."

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Asked what he would tell a black child who grew up with the notion of the United States as a colorblind nation, Gingrich said he'd respond: "We're not colorblind. I'd say it's a lie to walk into a school in America and say, 'This is a colorblind society.' And we shouldn't lie to children."

Newton Leroy "Newt" Gingrich
Newton Leroy

Pressed on what he would tell children who wondered what their opportunities were, Gingrich said his answer would be: "If you're black you have to work harder, and if you're black and poor you have to work twice as hard."

Gingrich, who has been intimately involved in District affairs, also was asked to respond to the suspicions of some residents that Republican interest in the city is part of a "conspiracy to boot out the black-run government" and "roust out" poor blacks.

"I understand the fear," he said. "What I want to do is transform Anacostia so the people currently living there are able to participate in the transformation so that five or 10 years from now they have new habits. Let me be very clear about this: I'm prepared to say to the poor, 'You have to learn new habits. The habits of being poor don't work. So yes, you've got to change.'"


Gingrich on women in combat: Women would have trouble staying in ditches "because they get infections;" "males are biologically driven to go out and hunt giraffes." A January 19, 1995, New York Times article reported on concerns about women in military combat roles that Gingrich had raised while teaching a history course at Georgia's Reinhardt College. The Times reported that Gingrich told his students that "females have biological problems staying in a ditch for 30 days because they get infections, and they don't have upper body strength," and added that men "are basically little piglets; you drop them in a ditch, they roll around in it."

Gingrich reportedly further said that if being in combat "means being on an Aegis class cruiser managing the computer controls for 12 ships and their rockets, a female again may be dramatically better than a male who gets very, very frustrated sitting in a chair all the time because males are biologically driven to go out and hunt giraffes."

Gingrich proposes denying welfare benefits to young mothers and instead using funds to establish orphanages. A December 11, 1994, New York Times article reported: "Mr. Gingrich ... has proposed that money saved by denying welfare benefits to young mothers be used to provided services to children, including promoting adoptions and establishing orphanages or group homes." Gingrich's proposal was included in his "Contract with America" under "The Personal Responsibility Act," which proposed to "[d]iscourage illegitimacy and teen pregnancy by prohibiting welfare to minor mothers and denying increased AFDC [Aid to Families with Dependent Children] for additional children while on welfare, cut spending for welfare programs, and enact a tough two-years-and-out provision with work requirements to promote individual responsibility."

According to the Contract's description of the proposal, "The state will use the funds for programs to reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancies, to promote adoption, to establish and operate orphanages, to establish and operate residential group homes for unwed mothers, or for any purpose the state deems appropriate."

Newt Gingrich: "[T]here is a gay and secular fascism in this country that wants to impose its will on the rest of us." On the November 14, 2008, edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, Gingrich stated of Proposition 8 protestors: "I think there is a gay and secular fascism in this country that wants to impose its will on the rest of us, is prepared to use violence, to use harassment. I think it is prepared to use the government if it can get control of it. I think that it is a very dangerous threat to anybody who believes in traditional religion." Gingrich also stated: "[W]hen the radicals lost the vote in California, they are determined to impose their will on this country no matter what the popular opinion, no matter what the law of the land."

Newt Gingrich: It's time to "profile" and "actively discriminate based on suspicious terrorist information." In a December 30, 2009, HumanEvents.com op-ed headlined "On Terrorism it's Time to Know, to Profile, and to Discriminate," Gingrich wrote that "our politically correct government" is not "targeting the source of threats." He added: "We know how to identify these enemies but our elites have refused to do so." Gingrich later wrote: "It is time to know more about would-be terrorists, to profile for terrorists and to actively discriminate based on suspicious terrorist information."