Conservative lawmakers in the House are planning to spend the hours before President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address on Tuesday similar to how they’ve spent the past several years — stoking fear about foreigners.
House Republicans are hosting a slate of committee hearings on Tuesday that will focus exclusively on supposed threats posed by foreign nations. That includes an Armed Services Committee hearing on “the pressing threat of the Chinese Communist Party to U.S. national defense”; a Financial Services Committee hearing on “combating the economic threat from China”; and an Oversight and Accountability Meeting on what’s being deemed “Biden’s border crisis.” (I fully expect China to be a topic of focus in this hearing, as well.)
As a primer, I invite you to check out this post I wrote last week on the GOP’s violent, and often racist, rhetoric toward the Chinese government and the people of China. As I wrote at the time, Republicans have seen little success in trying to portray Biden himself as an evil, corrupt threat to the country. But they’ve tried to sour voters on him by floating conspiracy theories about his deference to migrants and foreign nations at a time when many Americans are showing an openness to anti-immigrant bigotry.
Tuesday’s slate of hearings looks like more of the same.
President Joe Biden will deliver his second State of the Union address on Tuesday at 9 p.m. ET. Follow msnbc.com/sotu for live updates and analysis from experts and insiders.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.