Newt Gingrich defends Michele Bachmann's controversial anti-Muslim campaign

While many Republicans have been rushing to distance themselves from Minnesota Congresswoman Rep. Michele Bachmann's recent campaign to root out what she believes are Islamic infiltrators in the U.S. government, one former presidential primary rival is coming to her aid. Former Speaker of the House Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-GA) said on Politico Live's Internet-only TV show "Driving the Day" that Bachmann's inquiry is being unfairly maligned for asking questions that he believes need to be answered.

"I believe that Tony Blair is right, that this city is crazy about radical Islam," announced the erstwhile Speaker. When pressed by Politico's Jim VandeHei to explain what he means, Gingrich said that in his opinion, Washington, DC is too afraid of being politically incorrect to deal with the radical Islamists in its midst.

Look at the firestorm surrounding "these five members of Congress," he said, the group headed by Bachmann that has accused Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's top aide Human Abedin of being an infiltrator from the Muslim Brotherhood. He says they are asking "a very practical question: What is the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood on the U.S. government?"

When asked whether he supports Bachmann's allegations regarding Abedin, Gingrich side-stepped the question.

"There haven't been allegations, there was a question," he said, adding that he believes that "the question should be asked across the board."

Gingrich claimed that "the hysteria" that has greeted Bachmann and her committee's charges is proof that Washington is already in the pocket of radical Islam. "What is they're afraid of learning?" he asked of members of his own party who condemned Bachmann's call for investigation.

Incidentally, representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood, when asked about Bachmann's accusations by a Global Post reporter, replied that the rumors are "ridiculous."

"The Muslim Brotherhood," said Ibrahim Ali Iraqi, a Brotherhood leader in Egypt’s Daqheleya province, "can’t even penetrate the Egyptian government.”

Watch video of the Gingrich interiew, embedded via Politico, below: