Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has denounced Kwanzaa as a “fake religion” just as millions of Black people start to celebrate the weeklong holiday.
The far-right Georgia lawmaker berated the national College Republicans for “pandering and BS” after the GOP group tweeted a seemingly innocuous happy holiday message.
“Stop. It’s a fake religion created by a psychopath,” Greene said. “People are tired of pandering and BS.”
She was apparently deriding Kwanzaa founder Prof. Maulana Karenga, who was convicted of felony assault in the 1960s in what he says was a politically motivated prosecution spurred by his involvement in Black nationalist politics.
Greene suggested that the College Republicans should avoid political correctness if it wants to galvanize the conservative base of the GOP.
“You aren’t bringing in new voters, you are turning them away,” she added.
The College Republicans did not respond to Greene’s criticism about the tweet, which itself misspelled the name of the holiday as “Kwanza.”
Some Republican groups seek to highlight putative Republican values like personal responsibility, faith and prosperity to reach out to traditionally GOP-skeptical groups like Blacks, Latinos, gays and Jews.
But hardcore white Christian conservatives like Greene consider such outreach amounts to the watering down of their message to the base of GOP voters.
Kwanzaaa, which lasts for seven days, is a holiday festival, not a religion as Greene claims.
It was created in 1966 as a way to allow Black people worldwide to celebrate their common African roots.
Millions celebrate it alongside other end-of-year holidays like Christmas and Hanukkah.
Former President Trump tweeted a similar “Happy Kwanzaa” message during his stint in the White House, but Greene did not criticize her political hero for the greeting.
Story by Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News