SAN ANTONIO — A Republican hopeful for the U.S. Senate who used a racial slur to describe undocumented immigrants has defended the language as “normal” in South Texas.

Chris Mapp, a Port O'Connor businessman, stood by his comments that “wetbacks” should be shot by ranchers and that President Barack Obama is a “socialist son of a bitch” — remarks that have created a national stir among both parties.

“That kind of rhetoric is discouraging from anybody,” U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said during a visit to a San Antonio charter school Friday. “I recognize this is a free country but that's not the sort of way to gain people's confidence that you care about them and you want to represent their concerns in the halls of Congress.”

Mapp, 53, first made the remarks at an editorial board meeting with the Dallas Morning News last week, but told the San Antonio Express-News on Friday that using the derogatory term for Mexican immigrants is as “normal as breathing air in South Texas.”

He said he was discussing immigration policy and that the Dallas editorial board didn't include all of his statements.

“We can't have illegal immigrants, drug cartels, human traffickers or terrorists coming across our border,” he said. “Our borders can either be sealed by choice or force, and so far choice hasn't worked.”