Harvard University philosophy Professor Cornel West said he supports the four freshman lawmakers that compose the so-called progressive "squad" for reasons other than ideology.
West said Tuesday on "The Ingraham Angle" he doesn't agree with everything they say, but feels a moral and political connection.
"I stand in very deep moral and political solidarity with my four sisters -- not because I agree with every word -- but because they're looking at the world through the lens of the poor," he said.
"They're looking at the world through the lens of working people."
He added his support also has little to do with whether or not President Trump is a "racist."
"What we actually have with the president is not so much a question of whether he's a racist or not... the issue is, is he focusing on the most vulnerable and the most vincible?" West asked.
"This is not about partisanship. This is not about an '-ism'."
West added he would also have stood with Trump's late mother, Mary Anne, if someone in America told her to "go back to" her home country of Scotland.
Earlier Tuesday, one of the progressive lawmakers discussed by West, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., turned her attention to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., amid her ongoing feud with Trump over his recent comments.
In the broadside, the freshman Democrat said McConnell is "complicit in advancing racism" in the wake of the president's remarks about four Democratic congresswomen -- including Ocasio-Cortez -- needing to "go back" where they came from. Three of the four women were born in America.
"The majority leader is complicit in advancing racism in America if he doesn't even have the backbone to speak out," Ocasio-Cortez told ABC on Tuesday.
Her comments followed days of controversy surrounding Trump's tweets, provoking responses from politicians in both chambers of Congress. McConnell, on Tuesday, called on "everybody" to "tone down their rhetoric."
Fox News' Sam Dorman contributed to this report.
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