Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., exploded at a witness during a congressional hearing on Thursday after the witness pointed out that public universities deliberately limit the number of Asian–American applicants they accept.
Explosive exchange: @tedlieu yells at Peter Kirsanow when he mentions that one of the foremost examples of anti-Asian discrimination right now is at Harvard. This was during a hearing about the need for diversity on the federal courts. pic.twitter.com/q5cDrvSVmL
— Nic Rowan (@NicXTempore) March 25, 2021
Peter Kirsanow, a labor attorney and member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, was testifying during a hearing on diversity in federal courts when he referenced the ongoing legal battle involving a group of applicants who accused Harvard University of discriminating against Asians.
“If there is discrimination, it’s discrimination against Asian Americans,” Kirsanow said.
“In fact, just yesterday, or the day before yesterday, I filed a brief in the Students for Fair Admissions Harvard case in the Supreme Court,” he added.
Lieu, who is of Taiwanese ancestry, quickly cut off Kirsanow. “Stop bringing in irrelevant issues,” he erupted.
“There are more Asian Americans at these Ivy Leagues. In the federal judiciary, they’re underrepresented,” he continued. “These are different issues happening, so just answer my question about Asian Americans in the federal judiciary or minorities in the federal judiciary, because it is underrepresented.”
Kirsanow responded and said that while he agrees Asian–American judges aren’t as common in the federal judiciary as other ethnicities, that is in part because major universities are denying them the opportunity to even make it to the courts.
Lieu, however, continued to attack Kirsanow.
“The reason that you can’t talk about the federal judiciary and you keep going to the college issue is because you know you have no basis on the issue of the federal judiciary,” he claimed.
“It just needs to be more diverse,” he added. “It’s corrosive to America to have an entire third branch of government in which people were selected on the basis of them being white.”
Lieu did not offer evidence to support his claims.
The hearing came as Democrats have launched a push to mobilize Asian–American voters into their base using grievance culture as a lure.
President Joe Biden and others recently attempted to blame former president Donald Trump for a growing wave of Sinophobia due to his criticism of China over the coronavirus.
As if on cue, a 21-year-old white gunman massacred eight women—including six Asians—at Atlanta massage parlors.
Although federal investigators said race was not a motive, media and activists rushed to pin it to conspiracy theories about a “white supremacist” domestic terrorism threat.
Many of the recent assaults on Asians have occurred in heavily Democrat areas, such as the San Francisco Bay region, and were committed by non-white assailants.
Lieu, a graduate of Stanford University and Georgetown Law School, is one of only 14 self-identifying Asian Democrats currently in the House, although most are of Indian or Pacific-Islander descent.
Headline USA’s Ben Sellers contributed to this report.
