Carl Higbie resigned from the Trump administration today after CNN’s KFile found a trove of racist, sexist, anti-Muslim and anti-LGBT comments made by him on the radio. But this is the same Carl Higbie who, while appearing on Fox News prime time in 2016, advocated setting up a Muslim registry and cited Japanese internment camps as legal precedent.

You may recall that in November, 2016, shortly after Donald Trump won the election, Higbie visited The Kelly File to discuss a report that Trump’s policy advisors were considering a proposal to establish a registry for immigrants from Muslim countries. Here’s an excerpt from the discussion:

HIGBIE: Yeah, and to be perfectly honest, it is legal. They say it will hold constitutional muster. I know the ACLU is gonna challenge it, but I think it’ll pass, and we’ve done it with Iran back—back a while ago. We did it during World War II with Japanese, which, you know, call it what you will, maybe—

KELLY: Come on. You’re not—you’re not proposing we go back to the days of internment camps, I hope.

HIGBIE: No, no, no. I’m not proposing that at all, Megyn, but what I am saying is we need to protect America … I’m just saying there is precedent for it, and I’m not saying I agree with it, but in this case I absolutely believe that a regional based—

KELLY: You can’t be citing Japanese internment camps as precedent for anything the president-elect is gonna do.

HIGBIE: Look, the president needs to protect America first, and if that means having people that are not protected under our Constitution have some sort of registry so we can understand, until we can identify the true threat and where it’s coming from, I support it.

Not surprisingly, Higbie’s comments created a stir. A New York Times article reported the next day:

On Thursday, a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump did not reply to a request for comment. That night, a CNN reporter wrote on Twitter that Jason Miller, a spokesman for the Trump transition team, had issued the following statement: “President-elect Trump has never advocated for any registry or system that tracks individuals based on their religion, and to imply otherwise is completely false.

In other words, the Trump administration knew what kind of person Higbie was and had publicly disowned his views before appointing him to the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) in 2017. His role there, KFile reported, was “to direct the public image and messaging of the federal department that manages millions of Americans in volunteer services like AmeriCorps and Senior Corps.”

Here's a sample of what KFile found Higbie saying that prompted his sudden resignation:

• "We're promoting birth control to a black woman because of the incredibly high rate of children born out of wedlock that are under-cared for or not cared for at all. The taxpayers are tired of supporting government checks going to these people who think that breeding is a form of employment."

 

• "You cross my border, I will shoot you in the face," Higbie added. "I will go down there. I'll volunteer to go down there and stand on that border for, I don't know, a week or so at a time and that'll be my civil duty. I'll volunteer to do it."

Don’t forget, Trump promised to “hire the best people” once he took office.

Take a look at what Trump considers “the best” below, from the November 16, 2016 The Kelly File, via Media Matters.