A first-term Republican lawmaker referred to African Americans as “colored people” on the House floor Thursday, prompting outrage from Democrats and a quick rebuke from the chamber’s presiding officer.
Rep. Eli Crane (R-Ariz.) was reprimanded after he took to the floor to promote an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that he says will rein in Defense Department “wokeness” — a racially charged concept that has divided the parties and the country in recent years.
During debate over the amendment, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) — the former head of the Congressional Black Caucus — railed against the measure, arguing that Republicans were “setting us back.”
“I’m old enough to remember when Black officers, when women, were not allowed to serve,” Beatty said. “You are setting us back. On this floor on both sides of the aisle we have people of color, we have people who have served.”
Crane, a former Navy Seal, shot back after Beatty concluded her remarks, arguing that his amendment “has nothing to do with whether or not colored people or Black people or anybody can serve.”
“It has nothing to do with color of your skin,” he continued, ignoring an interruption from Beatty.
Once Crane wrapped up his comments, Beatty asked that his words “colored people” be stricken from the official record, calling it “offensive and very inappropriate.”
“I am asking for unanimous consent to take down the words of referring to me or any of my colleagues as colored people,” she said.
Crane initially responded by asking to amend his comments to say “people of color.” But Beatty wasn’t satisfied, asking again that his words be stricken, not altered. The lawmaker presiding over the near-empty chamber consented.
Hours later, in a statement, Crane said he “misspoke” while debating his amendment.
“In a heated floor debate on my amendment that would prohibit discrimination on the color of one’s skin in the Armed Forces, I misspoke,” he told The Hill. “Every one of us is made in the image of God and created equal.”
The contentious exchange came during debate over the annual NDAA, which, this year, has been highly controversial for a number of proposed amendments related to culture-war issues like abortion, transgender rights and diversity and inclusion initiatives in government.
Crane’s amendment would bar the Pentagon from requiring participation in trainings that teach what many conservatives would call “woke” concepts, specifically prohibiting topics related to race.
He argued that his amendment was “not divisive at all,” adding “what’s divisive is how the military is becoming a political, a social experiment.” At another point, he said the military was “never intended to be inclusive.”
“We need to have a military that continues to be the strongest military in the world because of standards. Because the people that we have there are the best of the best. The military was never intended to be, you know, inclusive. Its strength is not its diversity, its strength is its standards. And diversity can be a great thing, but that should not be our focus,” he said.
But it was his “colored people” remark that got most of the attention, drawing sharp criticism from Democratic lawmakers, including the Congressional Black Caucus, which called the comment “unconscionable.”
“This is a shameful moment on the House floor,” the group wrote on Twitter.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said it was “troubling to watch this roll off the tongue of a Congressman so easily.”
“This kind of racist language has no place in the U.S. House of Representatives. Or anywhere else,” he added on Twitter.
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), a member of the caucus, was more terse.
“Rep. Eli Crane just referred to Black service members as ‘colored people’. You can’t make this up. This is who these people are, and who they’ve always been,” she said in a tweet.
Crane is not the only Republican to become embroiled in a race-based controversy this week. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) sparked a firestorm earlier in the week when he told CNN that a white nationalists are not inherently racist.
The remarks were widely condemned by senators in both parties. Tuberville later reversed course, stipulating that white nationalists are indeed racists.