OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Republican Florida Rep. Byron Donalds went toe to toe with MSNBC host Joy Reid when she confronted him on things he had said about her.
“Last question, we’re out of time. I’m going to go through a few of your voting record items because you made some statements about me, what I have said, and saying I have tried to accuse you of being less Black than other folks which I think is an unfair statement, but that’s fine,” she said during her show on Tuesday.
But Reid called Rep. Donalds’ nomination for speaker of the House a “troll move” last week.
“Their plan is to just keep switching from alternative to alternative. They first tried to go with Jim Jordan, but Jim Jordan is in with McCarthy. And today they did this sort of, not in a surprising move, went with a Black guy with Chip Roy standing up and saying all sorts of things about Martin Luther King quotes and some of them were talking Frederick Douglass. This to me felt like a full troll and this guy was willing to go along with it,” the host said.
Joy Reid starts winding down the interview by filibustering Byron Donalds and complaining he was being "unfair" to have previously accused her of saying he's "less black than other folks" and invokes his 2020 election votes, not impeaching Trump, and opposing ballot harvesting. pic.twitter.com/rGzAedyi6P
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 11, 2023
And then she called him a black prop for the Republican Party.
“Never mind that Donalds supports voter suppression efforts, which disproportionately hurt Black Americans, but since when do details matter? Any Black guy will do, especially one that is very nice, big in stature, and goes along with the program,” she said.
During Tuesday’s show, she attacked the representatives’ voting record as damaging African Americans.
“You voted to reject the Arizona and Pennsylvania electors on Jan. 6. Donald Trump himself has implied that the reason that Pennsylvania was illegitimate is because of Philadelphia. That’s a statement about African American voters,” the host said.
“That’s not a statement about African Americans,” the representative said.
“You don’t believe that Donald Trump’s rhetoric led to the storming of the Capitol, even though we just had the Jan. 6 commission that said it did. You said that, OK, you questioned the election itself. You voted against impeachment. You voted against creating an independent commission for the Jan. 6 account. On voting laws, you voted, you defend voting laws that said getting rid of ballot harvesting is a good thing, so you defended the Florida voting laws,” she said.
“Florida voting laws are the best election laws in the country. Go ask Arizona. Go ask California. Go ask New York. We do it the best,” he said.
Joy Reid insinuates to Byron Donalds he's a token Black man being used by a white party: "It definitely looked like they were looking for a response to Hakeem Jeffries…[Democrats] are more diverse…Do you not believe…the idea was to make a diversity statement" with "you?" pic.twitter.com/LSSJ1RlwxK
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 11, 2023
She also claimed that his nomination against Democrat Minority Leader and New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries was a “diversity statement” because the Democratic Party is just “more diverse.”
“The reality is that a lot of members actually do believe in my ability to lead. They do. Am I to be despised for my youth because I served one term? My members know I have the ability to engage other members through the conference, but it’s even bigger than that. Listen, we were at an impasse last week in our speakership elections. We got that done. Kevin McCarthy is now speaker of the House. At the same time, I was working with members on both sides of our conference to make sure that we can get the job done, and we did. That’s the only thing that matters,” he said.
Joy Reid insinuates to Byron Donalds he's a token Black man being used by a white party: "It definitely looked like they were looking for a response to Hakeem Jeffries…[Democrats] are more diverse…Do you not believe…the idea was to make a diversity statement" with "you?" pic.twitter.com/LSSJ1RlwxK
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 11, 2023
As the segment ended, she criticized his criticism of Critical Race Theory.
“Critical race theory comes from critical theory. And essentially what it does at the graduate level, it talks about the implications of racial policies in the past in American history, their impact on society today. Hold on, the issue with critical race theory, if you distill it down to K-12 education is you do not have the ability to have a detailed conversation of critical race theory at the graduate level. Here’s my question. If it seeps down to K-12 education, is it stuff that students aren’t prepared to dealing with? Shouldn’t students just be learning about reading, writing and arithmetic?” the representative said.
“You don’t believe that students should learn about the racial history of the country? Because critical race theory is not taught in a single K-12 school. It’s a legal theory in some law schools,” she said. “Critical race theory is not taught in schools and learning about racial history would actually be good for you and the country.”
