GOP Racist Clown Show at Supreme Court Nominee Confirmation Hearing Ketanji Brown Jackson

In the face of news that is both shocking and unsurprising, the GOP has launched an ugly, racist attack against the absurdly qualified Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, whom President Joe Biden has nominated to do. The first black female Supreme Court Justice in the history of this nation.

At 10:52 a.m. on the second day of Jackson’s confirmation hearing, the official GOP account tweeted a GIF with her face next to the letters CRT, which was then scratched out and replaced with her initials KBJ.

Subtle.

You can throw away the whistles of longtime Republican propagandist Lee Atwater, the 2022 GOP is consistent with openly racist behavior.

Hours after the GOP’s racist tweet, Republican Senator Ted Cruz did his part to lay out the cause. Like a loyal salesman, he hinted that Judge Jackson was an anti-white extremist. He spent most of his time asking her about Critical Race Theory (CRT), knowing full well that his questions had nothing to do with or relate to her profession, qualifications, or performance. her as a Supreme Court Justice.

It’s an ugly theater of ridiculous people, but that’s exactly the point. This is red meat for the conservative establishment, which is increasingly radicalizing and adopting a steady diet of conspiracy theories and lies to intentionally and unscrupulously redefine CRT. as an evil ideology unleashed by the wicked state to teach our children against whites, against-democracy, Marxist sex offenders.

As Judge Jackson himself said in response to one of Senator Cruz’s many insulting questions, “[CRT] does not appear in my work as a judge. It was never something I researched or relied on and it would not be something I would rely on if I were on the Supreme Court. ”

But her record and statements don’t matter, because Judge Jackson is a Black woman – nominated by a Democratic president. That alone condemns her as a trojan horse who was supposed to use her considerable talent and strength to attack an increasingly paranoid GOP facility that has been told they are being hacked. “to replace”.

It’s important to remember that right-wing activist Chris Rufo, who created the cynical anti-CRT play, freely admits, “the aim is to get the public to read something crazy in the paper and right away.” immediately thought of “critical racial theory”. Republicans can do this, he said, by pairing CRT “with breaking news stories that are shocking, clear, and horrifying.” He wanted to produce CRT as a “striking political issue with an obvious villain.”

He was successful. That “villain” is by Toni Morrison Love, was successfully used by Governor Glenn Youngkin to win over suburban white mothers in Virginia. “The Villain” also includes books by Black and LGBTQ authors, and now transgender children and their parents.

This week, the villain is Judge Jackson.

Senator Cruz, imagining herself as the CRT dragon-slaying hero, brought up the issue of Judge Jackson’s relationship with Georgetown Day Private School in Washington DC, where she sits on the board. He accused the school, which had a historical role in integration before the end of the split, of having “filled up to overflowing” with “stacks and [CRT] books.” He specifically quoted Antiracist Baby by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi.

After revealing a large print of one of the pages of the book behind him, Senator Cruz asked bluntly, “Do you agree… that infants are subject to racism?”

With the patience and grace of a black woman who had to endure racial segregation and two standards of mediocrity her whole life, Judge Jackson sighed and replied after a pause. , “Senator, I don’t believe that any child should be made to feel as though they are racist or that they are not valued or even though they are inferior to their victims, that they are oppressors. I don’t believe in any of that.” (Incidentally, Dr. Kendi’s books can also be found in the library of the elite private school that Senator Cruz’s children attend..)

But, again, it didn’t matter what Judge Jackson believed. She’s a Black woman and as such, she now joins the GOP-produced gallery of troll villains ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections. , Senator Cruz played the whole GOP bingo card, even omitted the name Project 1619 and founder Nikole Hannah-Jones, who is now living comfortably and rent-free among the heads of the Republican Party, so much so that she should lean back, stretch her legs and find time to enjoy the apartments widely.

Not to be discouraged, Cruz went on with his uncanny quest to portray Judge Jackson as a stealthy CRT jihadist. He cited a 2020 speech Jackson gave on MLK Day at the University of Michigan in which she mentioned Project 1619. Judge Jackson responded by saying she mentioned the Pulitzer Prize-winning collection because it was both topical and familiar to her students. Cruz also cited a “curious statement” by Judge Jackson from a 2015 speech she gave at the University of Chicago, where she just addressed the critical race theory. She replied that it was one of many different types and theories of law she referred to to inform sentencing policy.

But the truth doesn’t matter to “the truth doesn’t care about your feelings” Republicans. Senator Cruz used his bully podium at nationally televised hearings to smear the well-qualified Supreme Court nominee as an anti-racist, extremist. White skin. While failing to prove his case, he successfully tarnished the judge’s reputation among his intended audience.

The reason the GOP blatantly invokes racism is because they have no other case. They couldn’t attack Jackson on her actual recording without lying. And as Tucker Carlson tried a few weeks ago by asking the examiners’ LSAT scores, they couldn’t honestly burn through her academic record either. They couldn’t get her to get riled up, as evidenced by her restraint, composure, and professionalism in Senator Cruz’s racist, bad faith questions.

The GOP is clearly soft on racism — I mean, two incumbent members of Congress spoke at a white nationalist convention and were condemned by the party leadership. harshly, who quickly changed the subject back to CRT panic.

Denying the obvious to any black woman in this country, conservatives insist that the only “real racists” are school-level teachers reading Antiracist Baby.

But today’s GOP concerted effort — both on social media and at the Senate’s first black Supreme Court nominee’s hearing — has conclusively demonstrated. It is clear that racism is an important plank of the Republican platform.