"The View" co-host Joy Behar defended Sen. Bernie Sanders (VT) on Tuesday for his praise of Fidel Castro's government improving literacy rates, despite his regime also arresting, torturing, and killing dissidents.
Sanders, the current frontrunner in the Democratic presidential primary, stood by his comments on "60 Minutes" during his CNN town hall on Monday.
"When Castro first came to power...he initiated a major literacy program. There was a lot of folks in Cuba at that point who were illiterate and he formed a literacy brigade that went out and they helped people learn to read and write. You know what? I think teaching people to read and write is a good thing," Sanders told the audience.
The other hosts on "The View" said it was wrong for Sanders, but Behar said Sanders was being criticized because "American voters don’t understand nuance."
"He said he was a bad guy. All he was saying was there was this one thing they did," Behar said.
"There’s no way around that. This is as bad as you know who saying there were good people on both sides. It’s the same," Whoopi Goldberg explained.
"I don’t agree," Behar replied curtly.
Sanders' comments have been heavily criticized, particularly from Republicans and Democrats who represent constituencies in Florida.
"I find Senator Bernie Sanders’ comments on Castro’s Cuba absolutely unacceptable," Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (D) said on Twitter. "The Castro regime murdered and jailed dissidents, and caused unspeakable harm to too many South Florida families. To this day, it remains an authoritarian regime that oppresses its people, subverts the free press, and stifles a free society."
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