Yet another week where Republicans demonstrated how out of touch they are with the American people. Indiana Senator Mike Braun drew everyone’s attention when he suggested the Supreme Court shouldn’t have legalized interracial marriage, while we witnessed two long days of Senate Republicans berating, interrupting, and attacking Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. 

This week, Senator Mike Braun drew attention after he was forced to walk back comments suggesting he believes states should be allowed to criminalize interracial marriage:

Rolling Stone: “Republican Senator Says Supreme Court Should Have Never Legalized Interracial Marriage”

Vanity Fair: “GOP  SENATOR MIKE BRAUN CLAIMS HE DIDN’T MEAN TO SAY STATES SHOULD BE ABLE TO BAN INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE, DESPITE SAYING IT MULTIPLE TIMES”

MSNBC: “Giving states power to ban interracial marriage? GOP senator sounds OK with it.”

To only further highlight how out of touch Republicans are, these comments came with a backdrop of Republicans repeatedly using racial overtones to attack Judge Jackson:

Washington Post: “References to Martin Luther King Jr. punctuated the preliminary comments from some GOP senators…Republicans have used King to express their solidarity with those sentiments before then using it as a shield behind which they pummeled Jackson with questions that come with racial overtones.”

Washington Post: “But it’s very important to recognize what the party is doing here. ‘Critical race theory’ (CRT) was elevated — and expanded — as a way of talking about conservative concerns about the perception that Whites held a diminished position in American society without being explicit about that perception. Here, the subterfuge is stripped away: Republicans are being warned that a Black nominee for the Supreme Court is hoping to inculcate this anti-White agenda. It’s not subtle.”

Washington Post: “But as the first Black woman nominated to the high court, Jackson also bears certain burdens that have become evident during her confirmation hearings. She has been subjected to questioning from some Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee that has been explicitly or implicitly all about race.”

New York Times: “The attack, the most dramatic of several launched from inside and outside the Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearing room, contained barely coded appeals to racism and clear nods to the fringes of the conservative world.”

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