The former Trump official joins a group of Republicans who have referred to the vice president as a diversity hire

Newsmax personality and former Trump aide Sebastian Gorka described Vice President Kamala Harris a “DEI hire” and “colored” in an interview on Tuesday.

In the segment, Gorka, himself accused of inflating his credentials as a terrorism expert, predicted that Biden will be forced to withdraw from the presidential race if major Democratic donors “pull the plug.”

  • MagicShel@programming.dev
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    5 months ago

    They’ve watered it down to the point of meaninglessness. She’s not a hire. She’s elected. You can’t even call it DEI unless you poll every American about why they voted for her.

    Spoiler: because she was attached to the ticket.

    • TheRealKuni@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      DEI is just a slur now. It’s their new broad-stroke insult for anyone who isn’t a straight cis white man.

      Consider the people who, after the ship hit the bridge, referred to “Baltimore’s DEI mayor.”

      • samus12345@lemmy.world
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        Yup, they latch onto concepts that they don’t really understand but know are opposed to white superiority: woke, DEI, CRT. Then they use them as a catch all for “bad thing.”

    • HomerianSymphony@lemmy.world
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      She’s not a hire.

      She was chosen by Joe Biden to be his running mate, after Biden had already cinched the Democrat nomination.

        • Bassman1805@lemmy.world
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          I mean, it’s a pretty key difference that she was only elected in that she was attached to the ticket that people were actually voting for.

          • qprimed@lemmy.ml
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            she was only elected in that she was attached to the ticket that people were actually voting for.

            ¿¡ they came as a pair. if either one were so completely distasteful, neither one would have elected. the “ticket” included everyone on it.

              • Furbag@lemmy.world
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                The very existence of Sarah Palin might give that theory a run for it’s money. She almost single-handedly tanked McCain’s election chances back when people doing bizarre and outrageous shit would actually convince voters that they were *checks notes* unqualified for the position.

            • Bassman1805@lemmy.world
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              I mean, that just kinda proves the point further?

              Anybody that’s gonna vote for Trump is gonna vote for him regardless of who his VP is. The VP is only TeChNiCaLlY an elected office, because 99.99% of people are voting for the president and not the VP.

              • ironhydroxide@sh.itjust.works
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                5 months ago

                At this point, we should be voting on who is chosen as VP. It’s almost certain either one will be the 49th. (That is, if we don’t go full monarchy and get some Drumpf spawn as 49th “president”)

                • Bassman1805@lemmy.world
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                  At this point, I think the best thing would be for Biden to run, get re-elected, and then die early in his term to make Kamala Harris the President. I’m not super thrilled about her but I think she’s better than just about any other option we’ve got at the moment.

                  I just don’t trust this fucking electorate to vote for a Black, Indian, Woman for president.

      • TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com
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        President and Vice President are elected as a team. I’m sorry that you see that as her “not getting elected” because you are wrong.

        She was elected Vice President. She is first in line to be President.

        Ask Sarah Palin if the VP name on the ticket matters.

    • redisdead@lemmy.world
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      As long as DEI, Affirmative Action, positive discrimination, w/e state encouraged discrimination is called nowadays exists, people will always question whether someone is there on merit or if they’re here to fill a quota.

            • redisdead@lemmy.world
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              Bigots will use it, sure. Other people too.

              Simply put DEI is racism and nothing good ever comes out of racism. It’s a piss poor solution. A band aid on a cancer tumor.

              Equality begins at birth. Education, healthcare, welfare, etc. should all be free and available to everyone. This is how you beat discrimination.

              When you’re a diversity hire, your talents and work will always be scrutinized harder than anyone else’s. Are you here because of your skills, or because you have the proper skin color and gender to fill the quota? It’s a struggle you will always deal with whether you like it or not.

              • Pandantic [they/them]@midwest.social
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                Equality begins at birth. Education, healthcare, welfare, etc. should all be free and available to everyone. This is how you beat discrimination.

                You should have probably lead with that. You got downvoted because you sounded like another right-wing dei basher imo.

              • Llamalitmus@lemmy.ca
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                I think provisional measures (“bandaid” solutions) should always come with an “until ____ is passed”. Because yes, it shouldn’t be how we have to do things. But while there isn’t the political will to do/get the thing that would actually help the situation, something needs to be done to mitigate the harm that already exists. For example, I don’t want to have to drink water from a dirty stream. That shouldn’t be the standard. But if I find myself in a situation where it’s that or to die of dehydration… restricting/denying the Band-Aid is essentially condemning them to the original harm

                • redisdead@lemmy.world
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                  The problem with band aid solutions is that the actual necessary measures never happen because “well we put a band aid on it so it’s ok.”

    • PeterLossGeorgeWall@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      I’ve never seen cishet written before and I’m here trying to pronounce it… Maybe it’s pronounced “cishay” like French? I figured it out in the end.

  • retrospectology@lemmy.world
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    I hope she gets the candidacy, not because I’m particularly enthusiastic about her politics (beggers can’t be choosers these days), but if for no other reason than to watch the right’s wall-eyed, impotent rage.

    • Instigate@aussie.zone
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      We got a small taste of that during the Obama years… just imagine what happens when you multiply African-American with South Asian and female! I think we’ll see those whose masks have been slowly cracking through the ‘45’ years go absolutely balls-to-the-wall mask off. It will be an interesting four years to say the least!

      Honestly, a part of me wants the Dump to be completely disqualified from running; Biden to step aside; and Nikki Haley to come back from the grave so that there’s a contest between two South Asian women for president. The voting public’s mind would EXPLODE.

      • retrospectology@lemmy.world
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        The right is entirely consolidated though, there is no room for a burst of silent bigots. Trump only garners around a quarter of the electorate, probably even less at this point, he is easily beatable it just needs to be someone who’s not Biden.

        Also, Obama won both terms, so I’m not sure what you mean. Dems ran a really bad candidate in 2016, depressing turn out of their own potential voters. Harris doesn’t have the baggage Clinton has.

        Conceding to misogynists and bigots from the get go is a non-starter as far as I’m concerned.

    • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
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      Not a good reason. I’m of the opinion that half the reason we got Trump in 2016 was because the right’s wall-eyed rage against Hillary turned out to be not so impotent after all. Everyone thought Trump would lose, but the right hated Hillary so much, it gave even those who were unmotivated by Trump a reason to go out just to vote against her. Anything that motivates the right to get up and go vote is a bad thing.

      • retrospectology@lemmy.world
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        Nah, she also has better polling than Biden. I’d rather have a chance to win than definitely lose, Harris is the most realistic option.

        The rage from the right has reached its saturation point, there simply aren’t enough bigots left to boost Trump’s numbers. Only way Dems lose is they fail to produce turn out, Biden simply has too much toxic baggage.

  • MushuChupacabra@lemmy.world
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    What kind of non-Aryan name is Gorka? I don’t think that this guy is white enough in name, and certainly not in looks, to start popping off on ethnicity and race.

  • paf0@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Meanwhile a British Hungarian Nazi grifter is essentially a diversity hire for the GOP.

    • chakan2@lemmy.world
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      No…his qualifications as a racist douchbag clearly made him the best choice for this role.

  • krashmo@lemmy.world
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    He may be wrong in his motives and his word choice but he’s right that the fact that she’s black and a woman was just as important as her credentials when she was picked as the VP candidate in 2020. If you don’t believe that just go read the post primary articles from that year talking about how Biden needed to pick someone not white as his running mate to pull in minority votes. Obviously this doesn’t mean she isn’t also qualified but you’re kidding yourself if you don’t acknowledge the reality that her skin color and gender were both primary factors in her selection. I’m not sure why that’s so difficult for people to say out loud.

    • skizzles@lemmy.ml
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      Because without context it comes across as racist.

      Which is exactly what these people are being when they are saying that she is a diversity hire. Basically that she was only hired because she is black/indian, and a woman, not because she is qualified.

      • krashmo@lemmy.world
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        He’s definitely saying it for racist reasons it just seems odd to me that people usually push back on that by saying race had nothing to do with it. It obviously did it’s just not the only factor like he’s saying it is.

        • Djtecha@lemm.ee
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          Well there are idiots in this world. So I’m sure there are some idiots saying things like this. But most people also understand that she was qualified for the position.

      • Asafum@feddit.nl
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        Republicans worship the concept of meritocracy as long as the discussion is only about white people and not about billionaires or minorities…

  • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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    We’re supposed to give a shit what racist Count Olaf from Lemony Snicket’s thinks!?

  • ATDA@lemmy.world
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    You ever seen someone who just wants to scream the N word? I can feel the n word circling his body like it’s a pee just pushing at the ancient prostate you know?

  • elliot_crane@lemmy.world
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    Colored

    And somehow I’m not surprised that a crusty old racist just straight up used a Jim Crow era descriptor to refer to the VPOTUS…

  • YeetPics@mander.xyz
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    Gorka much prefers nepotistic hires, like the kind you find in the governments of China, Russia and Trump’s cabinet.