He said there was no tape, which means that the NYT might not have taped it, and more importantly, that HE did not tape the interview. He should have.
We know that the "white supremacist" quote was accurate because King did not say it was inaccurate. He had plenty of opportunity to do so.
I notice that some threads on this subject don't show King's unfortunate quote, so here it is:
Steve King to the New York Times:
“White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?” Mr. King said. “Why did I sit in classes teaching me about the merits of our history and our civilization?”https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/10/us/politics/steve-king-trump-immigration-wall.html
We are always hearing terms such as racist, white supremacist, nationalist, white nationalist, Nazi being conflated with western civilization. They are often spoken in the same breath. How many times have we heard the term white men referred to in a negative way? The left is trying to make a negative connection in people’s minds with all of these terms. Everything associated with white people is negative. Maybe Rep. King was trying to round up all of these terms and how they are deliberately conflated by the left to make white people loathe themselves.