Kellyanne Conway asked a reporter 'what's your ethnicity' in response to a question on Trump's racist tweets

Leah Millis/Reuters

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway speaks to members of the news media after giving an interview to Fox News at the White House in Washington, DC, on July 16, 2019.

• White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Tuesday asked a reporter what his "ethnicity" is when questioned about President Donald Trump's recent racist tweets. 
• The reporter asked Conway how her question was relevant to his inquiry as she continued to defend Trump. 
• Trump earlier in the day defended his tweets and said he doesn't have a "racist bone" in his body. 

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Tuesday defended President Donald Trump's racist tweets from the weekend that played off of the "go back to Africa" trope. 

The tweets were aimed at four Democratic lawmakers who are women of color.

Trump in the incendiary tweets said the lawmakers, whom he said "who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe," should "go back" and "help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came."

When asked where Trump thought the lawmakers should "go back" to, since they are US citizens, Conway asked reporter Andrew Feinberg, "What's your ethnicity?"

Feinberg questioned how Conway's question was relevant to his inquiry. 

She insisted it was indeed relevant, stating, "It is, because you're asking about...[Trump] said, 'originally.' He said 'originally from.' And you know everything he has said since."

"He's tired," Conway went on to say of Trump, adding, "A lot of us are sick and tired of this country - of America coming last, to people who swore an oath of office."

Conway's comments to the press came after her husband, attorney George Conway, wrote a scathing op-ed for The Washington Post on Monday excoriating the president over his racist tweets. 

"I thought, President Trump was boorish, dim-witted, inarticulate, incoherent, narcissistic and insensitive. ... He'll attack anyone he thinks is critical of him," he wrote. 

Read more: Republican silence on Trump's racist tweets shows how fearful they've become of defying him and losing voters

Conway's husband went to say that no matter how "unfit" he felt Trump was for the presidency, he still wanted to give him "the benefit of the doubt about being a racist."

"No matter how much I came to dislike him, I didn't want to think that the president of the United States is a racial bigot," he added. "But Sunday left no doubt." 

Earlier on Tuesday, Trump in a tweet rejected the notion he's racist. 

"Those Tweets were NOT Racist," Trump said. "I don't have a Racist bone in my body!"

Trump has claimed the progressive lawmakers he has attacked "hate" the US and should therefore leave if they're unhappy.

In a separate tweet on Tuesday morning, the president said, "Our Country is Free, Beautiful and Very Successful. If you hate our Country, or if you are not happy here, you can leave!"