Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) argued Monday that, since many conservatives use the term “radical left” to refer to the growing far-left faction of the Democratic Party, Democrats should start calling Republicans an even more extreme name.
She tweeted Monday that Republicans should be referred to as “the terrorist right.”
Actors Sophia Bush and Patricia Arquette agreed with Speier. Bush said it’s “been time” to call Republicans terrorists and Arquette suggested calling members of the GOP “radical right terrorists.”
The “One Tree Hill” star also voiced her support for former President Donald Trump’s impeachment.
Speier is not alone in equating all Republicans to the fringe group of radicals who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), who has accused Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) of trying to get her killed, said during an appearance last week on MNSBC’s “All in with Chris Hayes” that the Republican caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives is filled with “legitimate white supremacist sympathizers.”
In November of last year, AOC called for Trump “sycophants” to be blacklisted from polite society. In response to her tweet, Michael Simon, a former Obama administration official, cited the “Trump Accountability Project,” a since-shuttered website listing the names of those who worked in Trump’s administration and on his campaign. The site’s landing page stated the “world should never forget who, when faced with a decision, chose to put their money, their time, and their reputations behind separating children from their families, encouraging racism and anti-Semitism, and negligently causing the unnecessary loss of life and economic devastation from our country’s failed response to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Singer Nancy Sinatra recently told The Guardian that she will “never forgive” those who voted for Trump. And CNN’s Don Lemon now-famously said in mid-January that all those who voted for Trump are wholly comparable to the Capitol rioters, are “on the side of the Klan,” are “on the Nazi side,” and are aligned with those who support slavery.
During a recent appearance on journalist Megyn Kelly’s podcast, Douglas Murray, author of “The Madness of Crowds” and an associate editor for The Spectator, pushed back against Lemon for making such a sweeping generalization.
“Why are [CNN anchors] saying that?” Murray asked. “Do they honestly believe that half of the voters in the American public are Nazis, are actually KKK? No, what they’re doing is they’re hurting the other side as much as they can — hit them as low as they can. That’s the game, that’s the cycle that the American public are caught in. And the truth is, we’ve just all gotta find a way out.”