Democrats in South Carolina are asking Gov. Henry McMaster to issue an apology after he said that he looks forward to the day that members of the party “are so rare, we have to hunt them with dogs.”
The Republican leader, 75, made the remarks at a state GOP convention on Saturday, according to NBC News.
A spokesman for the governor said that he meant the comment as a “joke,” the Greenville News reports.
“Governor McMaster has been making this joke at GOP conventions for years, and everyday South Carolinians understand that it’s a joke,” Brandon Charochak, the governor’s communications director, told the newspaper. “If South Carolina Democrat partisans can no longer bear light-hearted jokes made at their expense, then maybe they should focus their energy on winning and not whining.”