It only took two decades, but Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has finally stated publicly that she is not, in fact, a “person of color.”
Better late than never.
“As a country, we need to stop pretending that the same doors open for everyone, because they don’t,” the senator said Friday during an address at Morgan State University, which is historically black. “I’m not a person of color. And I haven’t lived your life or experienced anything like the subtle prejudice, or more overt harm, that you may have experienced just because of the color of your skin.”
It is worth pointing out here that these remarks come exactly 20 years after the Fordham Law Review, with no objection from Warren herself, billed her as Harvard Law School’s “first woman of color.” Two decades is not exactly a speedy turnaround time, but baby steps and all that. It’ll probably be another 20 years before she addresses the fact that she identified for nearly a decade as a “minority” in the Association of American Law Schools’ desk book despite the fact that the best she can say is that she is (maybe) 1/64th Cherokee. Who knows if she’ll ever address the fact that Harvard Law cited her supposed Cherokee heritage as a way to defuse criticism it lacked minority representation.
I figured Warren would have by now quietly shifted away from saying anything related to heritage, race, or minority status. Her DNA test in October was such an unmitigated disaster, you’d think she would have by now adopted a let’s-never-speak-of-this-again attitude. But you’d be wrong.
It has been eight weeks after she first announced her stupid test, and she is still trying to assure people that she “gets it” and that she definitely did not try to get a leg up in the world by coasting on bogus credentials. It is all extremely amusing considering the DNA test was supposed to be a sick burn against President Trump.
Think about it: She has had her eyes set on higher office for years, and her first foray into the White House arena was an attack that backfired in the most spectacular way possible. Instead of “owning” the president, she tripped all over herself, angering her own base while also making herself look like a too-clever-by-half schemer.
Honestly, at this point, Warren is the Wile E. Coyote of Congress.
As for the rest of the senator’s Friday address: It was more of the same from her usual bag of tricks, but with some carefully crafted nods included.
“Rules matter, and our government — not just individuals within the government, but the government itself — has systematically discriminated against black people in this country,” she said.
The collapse of 2008 hurt “millions of people — black, white, Latino, Asian — lost their homes. Millions lost their jobs. Millions lost their savings — millions, tens of millions, but not the people at the top.”
“The bank CEOs just kept raking in the money,” Warren said. “Two sets of rules: one for the wealthy and well-connected. And one for everybody else. Two sets of rules: one for white families. And one for everybody else.”
Preach it, sister.
