Rashida Tlaib called out the Republican Party for racism in a heated moment between the Republican and Democratic Party, and it has everyone talking. The heated moment centered around Lynne Patton and Representative Rashida Tlaib, a Democrat from Michigan. Working at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Patton is one of the most prominent members of the Trump administration, according to the New York Times. Before her time in the federal government, Patton also worked for the Trump Foundation.
Lynne Patton was brought up during the hearing, to defend Trump from accusations of racism.
Representative Mark Meadows, a Republican of North Carolina, invited her to the hearing. She stood by Meadows as he rebutted Cohen’s claims that Trump made racist comments such as “he told me that black people would never vote for him because they were too stupid.”
Meadows said: "I asked Lynne to come today in her personal capacity to actually shed some light. She says that as a daughter of a man born in Birmingham, Ala., that there is no way that she would work for an individual who was racist." Patton herself never said a word. She continued to stand behind Meadows until he finished speaking, then she left.
Representative Tlaib was appalled by this event
Tlaib called what happened racist and accused Representative Meadows of using a black woman as a prop.
She continued to express her displeasure of what Meadows did by saying, "As a person of color in this committee, that is how I felt at that moment and I wanted to express that. I’m saying that in itself it is a racist act."
This did not go over well with Meadows, who fired back, by saying that he had nieces and nephews of color.
The clash was quickly ended after this exchange, with Tlaib apologizing.
However, what Meadows did was racist
However, the fact is that Meadows was using Lynne Patton as a prop. In the context of the Cohen hearing, Patton is only around to deflect accusations of racism from the President. Her appearance was the equivalent to a white person saying, "I can’t be a racist, I have black friends." Patton, whether she knows it or not, was dehumanized at that moment.
When she was behind Meadows, she was not treated like a person. She was treated like a tool to be used to make President Trump not seem like a racist. She was not there to talk and her role in this event was to simply stand there and be the token black person.
Meanwhile, the argument that Trump cannot be racist because he has black employees is not true. It has been proven, time and time again, that a white person can be racist while seemingly treating people of color well. A pew research study conducted in 2009 is an excellent example of that, according to the Washington Post.
In the survey, almost 1500 White Americans were asked how they would describe Black Americans. Nine percent said that black people are not smart while 20 percent said that they do not see black people as law abiding citizens.
Yet most of these white Americans who expressed racist ideals still said that they had black friends. This research proves that white people can still be racists while being friendly with black people. Thus, Trump can have a black employee, even treat her well, yet still, be a racist.
Representative Meadows, with a doubt, did something racist when he invited Patton to the hearing to use her as a prop. Not only that, but he used a racist argument to attempt to prove that Donald Trump is not a bigot and when he brought up his "nephews and nieces of color". In trying to prove that Trump is not a racist, Mark Meadows had proven that he is a racist.
