Republican Rep. Claudia Tenney caught blowback on social media for invoking what many believe are racist tropes by describing the Democratic presidential nominee as a "DEI hire," in addition to being "uninformed and lazy" during a Fox News interview Friday.
In an interview with host Larry Kudlow, Tenney, of New York, ridiculed Harris' “cackle” and “horrible record,” and laid into President Joe Biden for picking Harris as “basically a diversity, equity and inclusion hire.”
“He wanted to hire a black woman,” Tenney said. “But I think Trump needs to be careful here because I think we need to really focus on her record.”
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GOP leaders have begged members to shy away from racist and sexist attacks on Harris, but that didn’t deter Tenney from continuing her thinly veiled rebuke.
“The bottom line to me, Larry, is she's uniformed and lazy,” Tenney said. “I think the best attack at her is going to go at her on substance, because she doesn’t have any. You scratch the surface with her, you get more surface.”
On social media, users ripped into Tenney for the insult.
“They’re not even using dog whistles anymore. This is just blatant racism,” wrote @HereLiesBlueDog.
“Racism doesn't sell with the majority of voters. They are going to find that out,” wrote @A_tothe_Z_Amber.
“It's amazing to think that racists were slightly more OK with a liberal president just because he was a white guy named Joe,” wrote @sirDukeDevin.
“And this is part of the reason why Republicans are going to get crushed. They can’t help themselves. The racism and misogyny is hard for them to control,” wrote @yonathanseleshi.
Watch the clip below or at this link.
