Congresswoman Ramirez Interrogates Republican Witness’s Use of White Supremacist Rhetoric and Great Replacement Conspiracy Theory

Washington, DC - During a Homeland Security hearing this week, Vice Ranking Member of the Homeland Security Committee (CHS) Congresswoman Delia C. Ramirez (IL-03) pushed back against a Republican witness who used the white supremacist Great Replacement Theory as a rationale to explain the migration human crisis. While questioning Derek Maltz, a former Special Agent in the Special Operations Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Congresswoman called out the danger of the Great Replacement Theory and how it has propelled violence in our communities, like mass shootings in Buffalo, New York and El Paso, Texas. 

“And as I think about the hearing now and hearing the witnesses, I think about just last year how a horrific domestic terror attack at Buffalo, New York supermarket left our nation reeling. My colleagues across the aisle offered up their thoughts and prayers, but they offered no actions to address racially and ethnically motivated violent extremism. It is not lost on me that before murdering ten people at the supermarket last year, the shooter wrote, and I quote, “We are experiencing an invasion on a level never seen before in history,” said Congresswoman Ramirez. 

“So despite knowing that the Pittsburgh shooter justified his actions based on the idea of an immigrant invasion to replace white people, despite knowing that invasion ideology was used to justify the shootings in El Paso and Buffalo, you continue to espouse this Great Replacement Theory and extremist ideology that people like me, when my mother crossed the border, pregnant with me, don't deserve to be here because we are invading the country?,” asked Congresswoman Ramirez to the Republican witness. “Mr. Chairman, this hearing is not a fact-finding mission. It's a raw political sham to stoke fear. And it will continue to justify the violence against immigrant communities, and I find that unacceptable.”

During the hearing, Congresswoman Ramirez also called out Republicans' relentless efforts to use the Homeland Security Committee as a political tool to push fear and violence against immigrant communities. She urged the Committee to instead work towards comprehensive immigration reform and delivering the resources necessary to support our communities.

The GOP-led hearing entitled “Biden and Mayorkas’ Open Border Advancing Cartel Crime in America ” included the testimonies of:

• Mr. Jaeson Jones, Private Citizen, Former Captain of Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism, Texas Department of Public Safety
• Ms. Jessica Vaughan, Director of Policy Studies, Center for Immigration Studies
• Mr. Derek Maltz, Private Citizen, Former Special Agent in Charge, Special Operations Division, Drug Enforcement Administration
• Vanda Felbab-Brown, Ph.D., Director, Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors, The Brookings Institution (Democratic witness)

For her complete line of questioning and witnesses' responses, click HERE.