Exposing the Democrats' Diversity Double Standards

During a recent appearance on “The View,” outgoing Congresswoman Mia Love called out the Democrats for their hypocrisy on diversity.  Love, a Haitian-American Republican from Utah who lost her re-election bid last year, claimed that the Democrats “targeted me because I was a…because I am a black female Republican. And they replaced me with a middle-aged white male in the state of Utah.”  Love continued: “They tried to get rid of every single diversity that they possibly could.  And to me, diversity on the left side is good for them if you think the same way they do.”  In other words, if the left really cared so much about diversity; they would not have worked so hard to take out Love. 

Never-Trumper Ana Navarro, who recently became one of the show’s permanent co-hosts on Fridays, said something that actually made sense for once in her life; in response to Love’s claim that the left wanted to get rid of her because of her race and gender: “I think it’s politics.  They wanted a majority…I don’t think it was them targeting a black woman.”

Great, Ana.  Thank you for your honesty.  I hope you keep that in mind in 2020; when Republicans will aim to expand their Senate majority and retake the House majority.  Republicans will have to oust a lot of women if they want to retake the House in 2020 and they will surely face accusations of sexism as soon as they begin to mount credible challengers against female Democratic incumbent.  So when Republicans target Lucy McBath, Abby Finkenauer, Cindy Axne, Cheri Bustos, Lauren Underwood, Elissa Slotkin, Haley Stevens, Angie Craig, Mikie Sherill, Xochitl Torres Small, Susie Lee, Kendra Horn, Elaine Luria, and Abigail Spanberger; all Democratic women who represent districts carried by President Trump in 2016, keep in mind the Navarro standard: “it’s politics. They want a majority. It wasn’t them targeting women.”

History shows that the left will not give Republicans the same deference Navarro gave to Democrats and dismiss their decision to target female and minority Democrats in the 2020 elections as just politics.  Democratic candidates at all levels of government have learned to use their race and gender as a shield and a sword; using their immutable characteristics against their Republican opponents as they attempt to paint them as bigots.  During a Florida gubernatorial debate, Republican Ron DeSantis brought up an FBI investigation into corruption at Tallahassee City Hall; specifically referencing how his Democratic opponent, Andrew Gillum, received tickets to the Broadway musical “Hamilton” from an undercover FBI agent. Gillum used his race when pushing back: “I don’t take free trips from anybody.  I know that may not fit your description of what you think people like me do, but I’ve worked hard for everything that I’ve gotten in my life.” Those looking for an example of a female candidate who exploited her gender for political gain should look no further than Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Most voters still judge candidates based on the content of their character rather than the color of their skin.  In politics, ideology matters more than identity.  Just look at the exit polls for the 2018 election.  If people really voted based on their identities rather than their ideologies, then Michigan’s African-American Republican Senate candidate John James would have won the black vote in his bid to defeat Michigan’s Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow.  Instead, James only received eight percent of the African-American vote; the exact same percentage that President Trump received nationwide.  Even though Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn still won the female vote, she won a higher percentage of the male vote than she did the female vote.  In every single race across the country, Republicans received a higher share of the male vote while Democrats received a higher share of the female vote.  Similarly, Republicans received a higher share of the white vote in just about every race across the country while the Democrats performed much better among minorities.   

Many Republicans believe that the party has to “moderate” its positions on several issues in order to win over minority voters; especially when it comes to supporting amnesty.  After citing a bunch of polls showing how immigrants feel about a host of the hot-button issues facing the country, Ann Coulter pointed out, “It’s not their position on amnesty that immigrants don’t like; it’s Republicans’ support for small government, gun rights, patriotism, the Constitution and capitalism.”  If Republicans abandon their support for these policies in order to appeal to minority groups, then they will have absolutely no constituency left. 

Going back to the exit polls, two very conservative Republicans managed to do quite well among minority voters.  DeSantis won 18 percent of the black female vote despite the fact that his opponent was the first African-American to ever become a major party nominee for Governor in the State of Florida. I guess DeSantis’s decision to use the phrase “monkey this up” didn’t hurt him after all.  Many attribute DeSantis’s stronger-than-average support among black females to his support for school choice; which benefits many African-Americans in poor neighborhoods by giving them the opportunity to attend better schools than the ones assigned to their ZIP codes.  The Democrats tend not to support school choice because the teachers’ unions make up a major part of the Democratic constituency.  The teachers’ unions don’t like the competition that comes from charter schools. 

In Texas, Governor Greg Abbott, one of the most conservative governors in the country, just won re-election with 45 percent of the Hispanic vote.  His opponent, a Latina lesbian, endorsed sanctuary cities; while Abbott signed into law a ban on sanctuary cities.

    

Just a thought: if Republicans want to do better among black voters in the future, maybe they should not hesitate to embrace social conservatism as much as they do.  For example, more blacks oppose gay marriage than whites.  In the ultimate political paradox, President Obama won California (and the country as a whole) in large part thanks to strong support from African-Americans and Latinos.  However, the same African-Americans who voted for President Obama in California, who pretended to believe in traditional marriage at the time, also delivered a death blow to liberals’ efforts to kill Proposition 8, a Constitutional amendment that would have enshrined the definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman.    

With support for same-sex marriage rising across the board, opposition to the redefinition of marriage remains highest among the African-American community. According to Pew Research Center, only 51 percent of African-Americans support same-sex marriage, in contrast to 64 percent of whites, and 60 percent of Hispanics.  At the state level, opposition to same-sex marriage remains highest in Alabama and Mississippi; which, in addition to boasting a large number of white evangelical Christians, also have enormous black populations compared to the rest of the country. Pew Research Center has reported that “by many measures, African-Americans are more religious than whites and Latinos,” specifically when it comes to daily prayer, attendance at religious services at least once a week, whether or not they believe in God with absolute certainty, and whether or not they see religion as very important in their lives.  So, Republicans, by all means, if you want to do better with African-Americans, transform yourselves into libertarians.

For the record, I first began writing this article eight months ago, right after Mia Love’s appearance on “The View.” but never finished it. I decided to add to it in light of an article I came across in Red Alert Politics complaining that the GOP “has a diversity problem” in light of African-American Congressman Will Hurd’s retirement. The article, which described the moderate Hurd as “one of the good guys,” mentioned that “with Hurd’s exit, Sen. Tim Scott will be the sole black Republican in Congress.”

Republicans’ “diversity problem” is not for a lack of trying.  Republicans ran a number of diverse candidates in the 2018 election cycle. 20 years ago, Young Kim would have had no trouble becoming the first Korean-American member of Congress by running in California’s 39^th Congressional District. However, decades of immigration and demographic change have turned that district blue.  Kim initially led when the results first came in but the seemingly never-ending counting of provisional ballots put her opponent over the top. Elizabeth Heng, who ran in California’s 16^th Congressional District, had an inspiring personal story as the daughter of refugees from communist Cambodia but that could not put her over the top in a district that Hillary Clinton carried with 58 percent of the vote.

Even some diverse candidates could not win in districts that President Trump carried.  African-American Eddie Edwards sought to win an open seat in New Hampshire’s 1^st Congressional District. Democrat Chris Pappas beat him by nine points in a district that President Trump won by 1.6 points. Just months after winning a race in a competitive district, Pappas has called for President Trump’s impeachment; making him the only Republican representing a Trump-won district to do so. Hopefully, voters in NH-1 will give Edwards (or any Republican) a look in 2020.

Maybe some Republicans think that a higher share of minorities in the Republican Congressional delegation will cause Democrats to finally stop calling Republicans racist. Don’t bet on it. Liberals have dubbed influential African-Americans in the conservative movement, especially Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, as “Uncle Toms.” Their treatment of Thomas and other African-American conservatives proves that liberals value conformity much more than diversity.  The left believes that everyone of a certain skin color, gender, religion, or sexual orientation must think the same way. They don’t mind engaging in discrimination, which they supposedly detest, against people who don’t think exactly like they do. For example, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus refused to let Republican Carlos Curbelo, who represented a South Florida Congressional district that Hillary Clinton carried, join the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.  They might as well call their “squad” the Congressional Democratic Hispanic Caucus.” Apparently, the CHC failed to realize how much common ground they had with Curbelo; he basically agrees with the left on immigration and climate change.

Curbelo’s rejection from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus proves just how tribal Washington has become but the Congressman, who lost his re-election bid last year, should not have felt the need to join the Congressional Hispanic Caucus just to feel important. Perhaps Bobby Jindal, the former Governor of Louisiana, said it best when he proclaimed “I am done with all of this talk about hyphenated Americans…We are all Americans.” I have no problem with the idea of a more diverse Republican caucus but I do have a problem with the obsession with achieving a diverse Republican caucus by any means necessary; including by nominating squishes over solid conservatives just to meet diversity quotas. I care more about how Republicans think than how they look.  Let’s aim for more women in Congress but Congress needs more women who think like Marsha Blackburn, Michele Bachmann, and Virginia Foxx and less who think like Susan Collins, Elise Stefanik, and Lisa Murkowski. Ultimately, the voters will decide who they want representing them in Congress next year and hopefully they will choose pro-life, pro-Trump, and pro-wall conservatives. More diversity would just be icing on the cake of a more conservative Republican Congress.