Joe Biden has done all sorts of things to compensate for the fact that he’s just an old white guy in a party that basically hates white people. He picked a black woman as his running mate, pledged to nominate a black woman to the Supreme Court, and routinely nominates people for various positions based on what diversity boxes they check off, rather than their competence. Under his administration, multiple government agencies have Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion offices to effectively mandate diversity in each department.
On Tuesday, Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.) questioned Ambassador Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley, the outgoing chief diversity and inclusion officer of the State Department (and the first person to hold that position), during a hearing on Capitol Hill and with incredible precision destroyed the entire justification of Abercrombie-Winstanley’s position.
Mast began by asking her if being bald, 5’-8”, or 6’-3” tall makes someone a better diplomat. Abercrombie-Winstanley began by laughing but eventually said no.
“Likewise, does being white make somebody a better diplomat?’ Mast continued.
“No, I do not believe so,” she responded.
Mast continued asking the same question of African Americans, Asians, Islanders, Native Americans, or any specific group, to which she affirmed that the answer was that “it doesn’t.”
Mast then asked her if he was white. Abercrombie-Winstanley couldn’t answer the question, repeatedly telling him she didn’t know.
“It shouldn’t matter that I’m half Mexican. It shouldn’t matter whether I’m able-bodied or ambulatory or not ambulatory. That doesn’t have anything to do with what my background is: that I served in these operations in the military, that I gained these skills, that I studied in school, that I proved that I can pass whatever tests under stress and duress and be effective in the field under situations that foreign service officers might encounter,” Mast explained. “That has nothing to do with how somebody looks; it has to do with: did they volunteer to do this? Do they have the skills to do this? Did we test them to make sure they had the skills to do this? Do we hire hard and hard and have the ability to manage a little bit easier?”
Mast then pointed out that this is the very problem with the State Department putting superficial diversity requirements ahead of qualifications. Mast then followed up by asking Abercrombie-Winstanley what the best candidate for any particular job looks like.
“I would say the best [candidate] for the particular job can look like any one of us, and that is the American way. That’s what we support.”
“So in that, we can’t have it be that first — we look for a diverse basket of candidates … and then after we look for the diverse basket, then we check the merit of that,” Mast said. “I’m glad that I served with a diverse force in the military, diverse colleagues as members of Congress, but that can’t be the number-one filter because it does create an inherent bias and inherent quota system.”
Being bald or 5’8” doesn’t make someone a better diplomat. Neither does being white, or Asian, or Native American, or Black, or Latino.
We don’t need the State Department to check boxes, we need it to further the foreign policy objectives of the United States. pic.twitter.com/lb4SgRjNz0
— Rep. Brian Mast (@RepBrianMast) June 13, 2023
The Democrats’ war on merit in favor of diversity is wrong, and Mast just blew it up by getting one of Biden’s administration’s own DEI officers to admit that race isn’t as important as merit.
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