Amid record low approval ratings, VP Harris tours colleges
In a stop in Georgia, the VP repeated debunked "slavery" claims and called on students to defend "DEI"
During September, amid record-low approval ratings for the Biden administration, a worsening economy, rising gas prices, increased tensions with China and Russia, and an unprecedented border crisis, Vice President Kamala Harris has been touring colleges.
The "Fight for Our Freedoms College Tour," was “launched” by Harris on Sept. 7 and no one seems to have paid much attention to it until now.
Where has Harris been going? Historically Black colleges and universities, Hispanic-serving institutions, community colleges, apprenticeship programs, and state schools, per the announcement by the White House.
One of the stops was in North Carolina, at North Carolina A&T in Greensboro on Sept. 15, we’ll get to that later on.
Per its announcement, the White House says the tour aims to "Mobilize students and young people in the fight for their rights."
What rights are they fighting for and why? More from the White House:
"At around a dozen schools across at least seven states, the Vice President will bring thousands of students together around the fight for reproductive freedom, common sense gun safety laws, climate action, voting rights, LGBTQ+ equality, and teaching America’s full history."
"The Vice President’s flurry of “Fight for Our Freedoms College Tour” stops will focus on key issues that disproportionately impact young people across the country – from reproductive freedom and gun safety to climate action, voting rights, LGBTQ+ equality, and book bans."
“This generation is critical to the urgent issues that are at stake right now for our future,” said Vice President Harris. “It is young leaders throughout America who know what the solutions look like and are organizing in their communities to make them a reality. My message to students is clear: We are counting on you, we need you, you are everything.”
So, from that overview, it looks like what is really going on is a voter turnout tour specifically engaging minority student voters on progressive priorities and culture war issues.
The "Fact Sheet" for Harris' tour is a list of mainly progressive priorities clearly meant to court the youth vote. Each item on the list comes with a set of bullet points of items the administration believes support their claim. Folks should take the time to read each one.
One of the most tone-deaf and weakest items on the list is that the Biden administration has been "making the economy work for workers," and is "lowering the cost of living."
Additionally, the Fact Sheet touts "a historic $130 billion" in pandemic relief funds as "investing" in K-12 schools - the schools the government shut down and the cause of historic learning loss nationwide. That's not an investment, that's running in with a bucket of water after burning one's own house down.
Investing in our Schools and Colleges
Supporting Student Borrowers
Expanding Health Care Access
Making the Economy Work for Workers
Lowering the Cost of Living
Standing up for Reproductive Rights
Preventing and Addressing Gender-Based Violence
Taking Action to End Gun Violence
Tackling the Climate Crisis and Advancing Environmental Justice
Strengthening Civil Rights and Voting Rights
Addressing a Failed Approach to Marijuana
Advancing Safe, Effective, and Accountable Policing
Multiple videos were posted by the White House of Harris' tour, one of which is now making the rounds on social media.
On Sept. 26, Harris visited Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. A segment of that visit has been circulating on social media in which Harris defends the practice of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, or DEI.
One of the moderators, Cedric Richmond, started down the road to the DEI question by saying that Biden and Harris claim all the time that "Black History is American History."
"So, when you look at and see the efforts to control, erase, and not teach the full history of this country, what do you think about that issue? What do you think about this moment in time?" Richmond asked.
"So what I say... the full sentence that I say is Black history is America's History. Period," responded Harris."It's not a debatable point."
Harris then went on to make remarks repeating her past statements about Florida's K-12 Social Studies standards.
"And, again, this Fight for Our Freedoms tour, is because we really are in a fight," said Harris. "Including the fight to be taught America's full history. And, again, book bans in this year of our Lord 2023, where there are people who walk around with their fancy flag pins and they want to be leaders of our country in the world and they dare to tell us that enslaved people benefitted from slavery?"
Harris continued, "They gaslight us as they try to insult us."
This is not the first time Harris has made the "benefitted from slavery" comment, in fact, she's nearly verbatim repeating remarks she made in July about Florida's new social studies standards.
This claim was quickly proven to be some gaslighting of her own, with two of the standards writers issuing a statement debunking the claim. Dr. William B. Allen, who is Black and one of the two standards writers issuing the statement, was very vocal about Harris' lie.
Allen is also a former chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
“It is the case that Africans proved resourceful, resilient and adaptive, and were able to develop skills and aptitudes which served to their benefit, both while enslaved and after enslaved,” Allen to ABC News, adding that Harris’s statements were “categorically false” and stated clearly that, “It was never said that slavery was beneficial to Africans.”
National Review writer Charles Cooke went as far as to call Harris' characterization of the Florida standards a "brazen lie" and that "It’s an astonishing lie. It’s an evil lie. It is so untrue — so deliberately and cynically misleading."
Following the repeat of the lie about the social studies standards, Harris then claimed multiple times that "they are trying to distract us."
They are trying to distract us, they are trying to divide our country," said Harris. "Understand what's going on. There is a plan afoot to distract from the fact that the very same ones who try to erase America's history don't have a plan for America's future."
She also made reference to the debunked "Florida Don't Say Gay Bill," which does not include such language but instead bars young children in elementary grades from being exposed to sexual topics including the controversial topic of gender ideology.
In discussions about "environmental equities," Harris turned to DEI.
"These extremist so-called leaders have started a whole movement to attack DEI... Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion," said Harris. "They are trying to... like they did with Woke...they are trying to turn DEI into a bad word."
She also said "they" are trying to paint DEI as "bad public policy" before stumping for the $1 billion the Biden administration has put "into the climate issue."
Harris directed her comments to "the students here" to "pay attention to what they are trying to do on DEI."
"They're saying we should not pay attention to diversity. They're saying we should not pay attention to equity. That we should not prioritize inclusion," Harris said. "And there's a movement afoot where they're literally putting pressure on corporations and law firms and filing lawsuits to undo DEI programs. So, part of your leadership will include what we need to do to push back against that."
Just days before Harris made her remarks on DEI, top Critical Race Theorist Ibram Kendi's "Anti-Racism Research Center" announced mass layoffs of around 40% of its staff and Boston University said it was launching an investigation into "fiscal mismanagement" of the center which has amassed $43 million in grants and donations. Per various reports, Kendi's Center has produced almost no research.
Former employees have accused Kendi of mishandling grant funding, failing to complete major projects, and fostering a company culture of fear and retaliation in which he was the final word on matters yet was routinely missing in action," according to Boston outlet The Daily Free Press.
Watch the full Morehouse College event video here:
More To The Story
On Sept. 15, Harris hit North Carolina A&T.
One of the questions asked during the North Carolina tour stop was "What did voters get" by voting for the Biden ticket in 2020 and what will they get in 2024.
"You elected Joe Biden President of the United States and me vice president of the United States," Harris said after asking for a show of hands who in attendance had voted in 2020.
"You did that," she said. "You elected the first HBCU graduate as vice president of the United States."
Harris attended Howard University as an undergraduate, which is an HCBU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities).
Harris didn't directly answer the question but instead devolved into one of her now-famous word salads.
"And so when we talk about voting there are many ways that you, each of you, will make a difference and that is one of the very important ways that you have already and will continue to make a difference by seeing and knowing that your voice is your vote, your vote is your voice."
Watch her full remarks at NC AT&T here:
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