Univision news anchor Jorge Ramos proves, once again, that racialism for its own sake is critical to his worldview, as past statements belie his most recent call for more Hispanic representation in the United States Congress. The call is there, but is it real? What does Ramos really mean?
Watch Ramos on his network's Sunday political affairs show, Al Punto, pointing out that there will be a record 37 Hispanic Members in the 116th Congress, while simultaneously bemoaning the fact that the amount of Hispanics in the Senate is not proportional to the percentage of Hispanics in the country:
JORGE RAMOS, HOST, AL PUNTO: Now there will be 37 Hispanic congressmen representing us. This is a record, but the truth is there’s still a long way to go. In the Senate, for example, we only have four senators of Latino origin when in reality there should be at least eighteen.
Mind you, this is the same Jorge Ramos that has, in the past, accused two of those four Senators of being race-traitors, and who cheered their respective defeats in the 2016 Republican presidential primary. As we explained in our review of Ramos’ interview for Spain’s El Intermedio, you can’t whine about a lack of proportional representation while at the same time dismissing half of the existing representation in the Senate as traitors.
Ramos’ racialist reductionism and wish-casting doesn’t take into account such things as the dynamics in each of the states where Hispanics have run and won, nor does he ask questions in the states where they don’t. In California, for example, State Senate President Pro Tempore Kevin de León challenged incumbent U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein. However, we don’t see Ramos questioning why Feinstein defeated de León, nor do we expect to see a post-mortem of this race in his weekly column. Such questions might prove to be uncomfortable.
Viewed in this light, Ramos’ calls for increased Hispanic representation in Congress is disingenuous at best. Does he really want more Marco Rubios and Ted Cruzes? Not likely. Given his history of statements and his dismissal of Hispanic conservatives, what remains left unsaid is that Ramos wants 18 Hispanics in the Senate, but only if they conform to the liberal mold of a Luis Gutiérrez, a Bob Menéndez, or now an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Diversity is still king in Ramos’ world, but only so long as it is skin deep. Conservatives, Hispanics or otherwise, need not apply.
