Tammy Duckworth: Don't let Tucker Carlson's comments on patriotism distract from Trump's failures
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) says Fox News host Tucker Carlson is questioning her patriotism in order to distract Americans from President Trump's incompetence.
Carlson and Trump are "desperate for America's attention to be on anything other than Donald Trump's failure to lead our nation," she wrote in a searing New York Times op-ed published Thursday. Trump wants Americans to focus on her rather than "mourning the 130,000 Americans killed by a virus he claimed would disappear in February" or remembering he is a "failed commander-in-chief" who has "still apparently done nothing about reports of Russia putting bounties on the heads of American troops in Afghanistan."
An Army veteran, Duckworth lost both her legs while serving in Iraq. Last weekend, she writes, she "expressed an openness to a 'national dialogue' about our founders' complex legacies." In response, Carlson said on his Monday night show she is a "deeply silly and unimpressive person" and one of several top Democrats who "actually hate America."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Duckworth said that "even knowing how my tour in Iraq would turn out," she would "do it all over ago," because of the "importance of protecting our founding values, including every American's right to speak out." She will fight "to defend every American's freedom to have his or her own opinion about Washington's flawed history," Duckworth continued, and Carlson needs to learn "we can honor our founders while acknowledging their serious faults, including the undeniable fact that many of them enslaved Black Americans." He and Trump should also know, she added, "that attacks from self-serving, insecure men who can't tell the difference between true patriotism and hateful nationalism will never diminish my love for this country — or my willingness to sacrifice for it so they don't have to. These titanium legs don't buckle."
Read Duckworth's entire op-ed at The New York Times.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
-
Could Trump run for a third term?The Explainer Constitutional amendment limits US presidents to two terms, but Trump diehards claim there is a loophole
-
Political cartoons for November 28Cartoons Friday's political cartoons include economic diagnosis, climate distractions, and more
-
What does the fall in net migration mean for the UK?Today’s Big Question With Labour and the Tories trying to ‘claim credit’ for lower figures, the ‘underlying picture is far less clear-cut’
-
Judge halts Trump’s DC Guard deploymentSpeed Read The Trump administration has ‘infringed upon the District’s right to govern itself,’ the judge ruled
-
Trump accuses Democrats of sedition meriting ‘death’Speed Read The president called for Democratic lawmakers to be arrested for urging the military to refuse illegal orders
-
Court strikes down Texas GOP gerrymanderSpeed Read The Texas congressional map ordered by Trump is likely an illegal racial gerrymander, the court ruled
-
Trump defends Saudi prince, shrugs off Khashoggi murderSpeed Read The president rebuked an ABC News reporter for asking Mohammed bin Salman about the death of a Washington Post journalist at the Saudi Consulate in 2018
-
Congress passes bill to force release of Epstein filesSpeed Read The Justice Department will release all files from its Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation
-
Trump says he will sell F-35 jets to Saudi ArabiaSpeed Read The president plans to make several deals with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman this week
-
Judge blasts ‘profound’ errors in Comey caseSpeed Read ‘Government misconduct’ may necessitate dismissing the charges against the former FBI director altogether
-
Ecuador rejects push to allow US military basesSpeed Read Voters rejected a repeal of a constitutional ban on US and other foreign military bases in the country
