Interior Secretary Doug Burgum on Sunday defended an Independence Day demonstration in Washington by hundreds of masked men chanting “reclaim America!”

Wearing the same uniform — white face coverings, baseball caps, dark shirts and khakis — as that of the white nationalist group Patriot Front, they marched near the U.S. Capitol carrying a variety of flags, including Confederate flags. Some featured a circle of 13 white stars to represent the first American colonies.

“What they stand for is nothing that I could possibly agree with,” Burgum said during an interview on CNN. “But one of the foundational principles of the United States, which makes democracy messy, is free speech.”

“There are plenty of things that I see that I might personally find offensive, reprehensible. But in America, free speech is allowed,” he said, before comparing a public display of racial supremacy to communism.

Echoing President Donald Trump’s midterm-election season attacks on the Democratic Party’s insurgency of democratic socialist candidates, Burgum said, “I mean, we’re a country where someone can run and be elected saying that they’re a communist, but yet this is what our nation has stood against and fought for.”

The Interior Department secretary, who oversaw Trump-branded celebrations of the nation’s 250th anniversary, didn’t directly answer when host Dana Bash asked if he would recommend to Trump that the president condemn the white nationalist group and its messaging.

“Part of my response to that is that there are protests on the mall that people say things that I think are reprehensible about President Trump, and yet they’re allowed to go on because of free speech in our country,” Burgum replied.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, among other civil rights groups, labels Patriot Front a “white nationalist hate group that broke off from Vanguard America in the aftermath of the deadly ‘Unite the Right’ rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, of August 12, 2017.”

Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department said in a statement that it was “tracking First Amendment activities that occurred” in the Eastern Market neighborhood” of Capitol Hill and that it “recognizes the rights of individuals to peacefully express their views and remains committed to maintaining public safety and security for D.C. residents and visitors.”

According to its public writings, Patriot Front believes that “to be an American is to be a descendant of conquerors, pioneers, visionaries, and explorers,” and that the country was founded on principles of a pan-European identity.

Rep. Al Green, a Black Democrat from Texas, told MS NOW on Sunday that he wants such hate groups to “have their free speech.”

“Let them march and let people see that this level of racism and hate still exists, that the Klan has only metamorphosed now,” Green said on “The Weekend.”

Green said he has enough faith in the country to “think that most people don’t approve of people who would parade with a mask on to disguise themselves while shouting something that’s associated with white supremacy. I don’t think people will agree with that.”

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