Rep. Karen Bass is attempting to distance herself from comments she read into the congressional record three years ago, praising a longtime member of Communist Party USA as a “friend and mentor.”
During a eulogy for Oneil Marion Cannon in 2017, Bass, a Democrat, called Cannon a “one man force in progressive politics” and said his contributions to minority communities in the United States were powerful.
“Deeply involved in politics, Oneil belonged to the Independent Progressive Party and campaigned to put Henry Wallace on the ballot in the late 1940s,” Bass said in her speech. “As part of the IPP, he used economic power to force employers to hire black and Mexican American workers, using the slogan, ‘Don’t bank or buy where you can’t work.’ He worked for decades to elect representatives of color to office, including Tom Bradley, Ed Roybal, and even campaigning at age 90 for Barack Obama.”
Bass saluted Cannon for his “long-standing commitment to serving and uplifting others and for a century of fighting to make the world a better place.”
An obituary for Cannon mentions his time as the “education director for the Communist Party USA in the Southern California District, and a member of the Party’s Southern California and National Central Committees.”
“Karen Bass has always been a Democrat and only a Democrat,” a spokesman told Politico in reference to Bass’s praise of Cannon. “The congresswoman is friends with Kevin McCarthy and is not a Republican. She knew Oneil Cannon but never shared the political ideology he may have had at one time in his life.”
Bass’s comments about Cannon and other radical political figures similar to him have come under increasing scrutiny as she remains on presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s shortlist as a potential vice presidential pick.
In a statement issued shortly after the death of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, Bass called Castro “Comandante en Jefe,” or commander in chief in Spanish. Those remarks have worried some Democrats in Florida that a decision by Biden to pick Bass could hurt his chances of carrying the state in November.
“The comments are troubling. It shows a lack of understanding about what the Castro regime was about. So I have to learn more about her position and perspective on Fidel Castro,” said Florida state Rep. Javier Fernandez. “Praise like the one that was given by Bass at the time of Castro’s death is inconsistent with my family’s experience with what the regime did — and continues to do — to people on the island, which is to suppress human rights, keep people under a totalitarian thumb, and stifle economic growth.”
Bass dismissed any assertion that she has communist sympathies when pressed about her years-old, but warm, characterizations of fascist dictators.
“I have talked to my colleagues in the House about that, and it’s certainly something that I would not say again,” Bass said late last month. “I have always supported the Cuban people and the relationship that Barack Obama and Biden had in their administration in terms of opening up relations.”
The congresswoman has also expressed discomfort with the messaging behind the Black Lives Matter movement — a group President Trump and other Republicans have described as a Marxist outfit seeking to destroy American institutions.
“I told some friends that’s probably one of the worst slogans ever,” she said of calls to “defund the police” in the wake of George Floyd’s death. “Police officers are the first ones to say they are law enforcement officers. They’re not social workers. What we have done in our country is we have not invested in health, social, and economic problems in communities. We leave the police to pick up the pieces.”
Biden has promised to pick a woman as his running mate, and many political strategists view his choosing of a woman of color as needed evidence that he will have an inclusive cabinet.
“I think anybody that is willing to become vice president, if they’re invited, should be ready,” Bass said of Biden. “And I think that I am.”
