Mike Pompeo claims 'multiculturalism' is anti-American
In a statement posted to his Twitter account on his last full day on the job, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo complained that "censorship, wokeness, political correctness ... all points in one direction — authoritarianism, cloaked as moral righteousness." He continued his diatribe in a caption above the image of the statement. "Woke-ism, multiculturalism, all the -isms, they're not who America is," he wrote, adding that they "distort our glorious founding" and allow foreign enemies to "stoke" societal divisions to weaken the United States.
The debate about political correctness and so-called "cancel culture" is fairly ubiquitous these days, so while his stance on those matters may have elicited some eye rolls, critics were probably not surprised. Describing multiculturalism as anti-American, however, struck a nerve. Some commentators suggested the words were bigoted, while others added that it's Pompeo himself who is distorting America's founding by pushing such an argument.
Woke-ism and political correctness complaints are standard political fare, but the Secretary of State really sounds like a member of the unreconstructed European far-right with the jibe at multiculturalism https://t.co/o47KdWJRti
— Katerina Ang (@katerinareports) January 19, 2021
I’m not a scholar of these things, but is there a non-bigoted way to interpret the idea that “multiculturalism” makes America weak and is not “who America is?” https://t.co/8nX7FuEAOr
— Isaac Chotiner (@IChotiner) January 19, 2021
Multiculturalism is not America?
"The bosom of America is open to receive not only the Opulent and respectable Stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all Nations and Religions ..."
George Washington, 1783. https://t.co/b23JXQwz8L— Tom Gjelten (@tgjelten) January 19, 2021