Breitbart editor's college grant for white men draws fire

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Milo Yiannopoulos

A college grant program for white males that is now taking applications is being blasted as fanning white nationalism.

Breitbart News senior editor Milo Yiannopoulos announced the Yiannopoulos Privilege Grant in July. The program, which is funded by the right-wing provocateur and private donors, began taking applications on Tuesday, Breitbart reports. 

"No this isn't a joke," he said.

Yiannopoulos has received condemnation by critics in the past. In July, he was banned from Twitter for tweeting abusive comments toward specific users, including African-American comedian Leslie Jones.

Asked about the scholarship program, UC Berkeley law professor Ian Haney Lopez said Wednesday that affirmative action programs were undertaken "to welcome historically excluded and dehumanized groups into every school, neighborhood and workplace."

"Affirmative action for white men is not social repair. Affirmative action for white men is a stunt to mock the moral and socialIMPORTANCE of integration and to increase social strife," he told CNBC.

Princeton University professor Eddie S. Glaude Jr. said the program was part of "a white nationalist agenda clearly and unapologetically."

"We should all be deeply troubled by the connection between Steve Bannon in the White House and Milo Yiannopoulos at Breitbart," Glaude told CNBC by telephone. Bannon, aTOP advisor to President Donald Trump, was the executive chairman of Breitbart News. He joined the Trump campaign a month after the grant program was announced.

Yiannopoulos, Breitbart and the White House did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment.