Tom McClintock thinks studying reparations is ‘evil.’ He should learn more about slavery

Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Elk Grove, keeps trying to sound smart on issues of race. The more he speaks, however, the more he reveals a glaring ignorance and insensitivity.

This week, McClintock assailed a congressional proposal to study the idea of reparations for slavery. On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee voted to create a commission to examine the legacy of slavery and possible ways to address it.

McClintock voted against the legislation and used the word “evil” to describe it.

“It is evil in its effect, if not in its intent,” McClintock said during the committee debate Wednesday night, according to a story by McClatchy DC reporter David Lightman.

“It’s designed to reach into the dead past, revive its conflicts and then reintroduce them into our age,” said McClintock, who claimed the United States has made progress toward becoming a colorblind society.

McClintock spoke at a moment when the country continues to grapple with the police killing of Daunte Wright — just miles away from where the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin is taking place. Chauvin’s trial has forced the nation to relive the brutal murder of George Floyd.

In addition, the U.S. has grappled with a recent wave of racist attacks on Asians and Asian Americans

Of course, McClintock doesn’t see a problem there, either. Speaking on the House floor last month, McClintock appeared to downplay the recent spate of violent and racist attacks against Asians.

“If America were such a hate-filled, discriminatory, racist society filled with animus against Asian Americans, how do you explain the remarkable success of Asian Americans in our country?” McClintock said.

After reciting FBI statistics from 2019 in order to downplay the prevalence of anti-Asian hate crimes, McClintock threw out some economic statistics in an effort to further deny racism.

“What should make us all proud as Americans is the fact that Asian Americans have the highest median income of any ethnic group in America, including white Americans,” McClintock said. “Median income for Asian Americans is 38% higher than the national median.”

What? Is McClintock using old statistics and the “model minority myth” to try to downplay hate crimes and violence? On second thought, perhaps he’s not stumbling into these flawed arguments accidentally. He seems to be doing his best to be deliberately offensive and to deny the existence of systemic racism.

That’s why his thoughts on this issue lack value. This nation is in the middle of a major reckoning on racism, not just in the past, but in the present. The evil institution of American slavery brutally and systematically dehumanized and disenfranchised Black people for hundreds of years. It was followed by segregation, Jim Crow, lynchings and countless other pernicious institutional features designed to keep Black people down.

These systems remain imprinted in our institutions today, producing a host of inequities that manifest in education, health, housing, policing and the workplace.

“It’s not about who’s to blame...it’s about who was denied opportunities, and how do we look at making sure everybody in America is treated fairly,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose. “That’s what this commission is about.”

“We’re asking for people to understand the pain, the violence, the brutality, the chattle-ness of what we went through,” said Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, the bill’s chief sponsor. “And of course we’re asking for harmony….to come together as Americans.”

The legislation passed the House committee, but its fate remains uncertain. The idea provokes controversy, but a conversation over how to repair the legacy of slavery and systemic racism is long overdue. Last year, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill to create a task force to study the possibility of reparations.

McClintock clearly doesn’t grasp this issue, but that’s not surprising. He has repeatedly voted against bills to help his own constituents who are suffering from the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s no wonder that he doesn’t believe in the need to help people overcoming the historic yet persistent harm of slavery.