Steve Scalise on ‘Fox News Sunday’

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) will this weekend make his first appearance on the Sunday show circuit, since he admitted that he spoke to a white supremacist group as a state lawmaker.

Scalise will be a guest on “Fox News Sunday.” 

He joins Fox News after a hectic week for the House Republican leadership, as it grappled with Department of Homeland Security funding. When the Senate agreed to vote on a “clean” bill this week that would not affect President Obama’s executive actions on immigration, House leaders decided to vote Friday on a three-week stopgap measure to stave off a shutdown of the department. 

As of Friday, it’s unclear whether that proposal will pass the House, as Democrats are calling for a longer funding deal, and many Republicans are wary of a plan that doesn’t halt President Obama’s controversial immigration actions.  

As majority whip, it’s Scalise’s job to bring his members into line to support the leadership’s agenda.

The lawmaker has kept a relatively low profile since it emerged that he spoke at a meeting of a white supremacist group connected to former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke in 2002. Scalise was a state legislator at the time. While in the statehouse, Scalise also voted against designating Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday as a state holiday and against a bill apologizing for slavery.

Scalise hasn’t made extensive public remarks on the controversy despite calls from black leaders to do so. He also declined to travel to Selma, Ala., for ceremonies marking the 50th anniversary of the landmark march for civil rights that began in the city, despite the urgings by some members of the Congressional Black Caucus. He told The Hill he would go next year.