Lee opposed the establishment of two new Smithsonian museums. By
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The Senate is considering two bipartisan bills to establish national museums of Latinx and women’s history.
Utah Sen. Mike Lee spoke out against this legislation during a Senate session on Thursday.
In addition to senators on both sides of the aisle, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pushed back against his opposition on Twitter.
A Utah Senator provoked ire on the Senate floor and online when he opposed national museums dedicated to Latino and Women’s history.
“My objection to the creation of a new Smithsonian museum or series of museums based on group identity, what Theodore Roosevelt called Hyphenated Americanism is not a matter of budgetary or legislative technicalities, said Utah Sen. Mike Lee, who represents a population of 462,054 Hispanic citizens, during a session of the Senate on Thursday. It s a matter of national unity and cultural inclusion. Now we ve seen in
tonight and hugh hewitt is not defined by the craziest person or the most ill liberal person who says they are on our side in any debate. we re defined by ourselves and donald trump and ben carson and every republican is defined by themselves. jeb bush said tonight he is not for a multi-cultural society. and some people are trying to make that let me read that to you. these are his comments. he said we should not have a multi-cultural society. when you create pockets of isolation and in some cases the assimilation process has been retarded, it s wrong. it limits people s aspiration. it seems kind of strange coming from him because he has a multi-cultural family himself. he has defended his use of spanish language on the campaign trail and in ads. what is going on here, hugh? something that s been going on for a hundred years. teddy roosevelt was the first president to denounce hyphenated americanism followed by woodrow wilson who also denounced hyphenated americanism.
how many races or how many ethnicities or nationalities. it s the fact that because that s a great strength. it gives us a strength no other country on earth has. the weakness is what we have what we are not doing in a culturation, americanization, a century ago, everybody became american through the public schools, the civic institutions, you learn the language. you learn the history. you learn civics. you learn about america. it s not that you abandon your ethnicity but you are instilled with americanness and now with the multicultural vogue, you get bilingual education, separatism, multiculturalism which essentially says being separate and having a hyphenated americanism is the essence of who we ought to be. i think it s a mistake and we will suffer. i grew up in quebec where we had a bilingual society. it s really difficult and creates all kinds of things and quebec had it at birth.