The next time Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, releases a clothing line to troll liberals, the pieces might as well have tread marks on them.
Republicans are officially throwing the artist under the bus after years of celebrating his bigoted remarks and using him to try to convince young people — particularly, young Black people — to become conservatives.
On Friday, the Republican National Committee officially passed a resolution that it claims is meant to denounce antisemitism. The resolution name-checks Ye and white nationalist Nick Fuentes while conspicuously ignoring conservatives who’ve also trafficked in antisemitism — such as Donald Trump, who dined with both men at his Florida estate in November.
Mere months after touting Ye as part of a triumvirate of conservative leaders (remember the “Kanye. Elon. Trump.” tweet from last fall), Republicans are trying to backpedal from the “Lift Yourself” rapper.
Here’s the passage condemning Ye:
WHEREAS, Rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has repeatedly made statements that are antisemitic, shameful, wrong, offensive, bigoted, and contrary to American and Republican principles, among these statements, “the Jewish media has made us feel like the Nazis and Hitler have never offered anything of value to the world… we’ve got to stop dissing the Nazis all of the time”;
The passage condemning Fuentes, who’s well connected among conservative lawmakers like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, cites antisemitic comments he made while denying the Holocaust.
If you’re thinking the resolution sounds surprisingly sober-minded coming from the GOP — not so fast. Along with denouncing actual antisemitism by these right-wing hatemongers, the resolution also condemns several Democrats over their criticism of the Israeli government, including Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.
This would not be a Republican statement without a great deal of conflation, after all.
And that’s what makes the resolution wholly unserious.
It doesn’t mention Trump, who built a long list of antisemitic behavior predating his dinner with Ye and Fuentes. It doesn’t mention Greene (aka the “Jewish space laser” conspiracy theorist) or Gosar, who’ve both been given assignments on the powerful House Oversight Committee by Speaker Kevin McCarthy. It doesn’t mention Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., who reportedly has lied about having Jewish heritage and his grandparents’ having survived the Holocaust. It doesn’t condemn Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose office was criticized after its silence on some of his supporters’ use of Nazi imagery. It also doesn’t condemn Tucker Carlson — or the numerous other conservatives, for that matter — who’ve spread the racist “replacement theory” popular among neo-Nazis.
Sadly, backing the bus over Ye and Nick Fuentes won’t rid the GOP of its antisemitic bent.
The resolution concludes by saying the Republican National Committee “affirms antisemitism has no place in our political party, American politics, or any political discourse.”
Sadly, backing the bus over Ye and Nick Fuentes won’t rid the GOP of its antisemitic bent. There’s a lot more where that came from.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.