Every Democratic United States senator refused to comment to a conservative news outlet on whether statues depicting President George Washington should be removed.
The Daily Caller reached out to the offices of all the Democratic senators, as well as independent Sens. Angus King and Bernie Sanders who caucus with the Democrats, and asked whether they support the removal of statues representing the first president. Not one returned the request for comment.
One senator, Tammy Duckworth from Illinois, recently said she supports a conversation on removing such statues.
“He should be talking about what we’re going to do to overcome this pandemic,” Duckworth said of President Trump during a CNN interview earlier in July. “What are we going to do to push Russia back? Instead, he had no time for that. He spent all his time talking about dead traitors.”
She added during the interview, “I think we should listen to the argument there. But remember that the president at Mount Rushmore was standing on ground that was stolen from Native Americans who had actually been given that land during a treaty.”
Duckworth published an op-ed in the New York Times following the remarks, saying, “Setting aside the fact that the right wing’s right to lie about me is one of the rights I fought to defend, let me be clear: I don’t want George Washington’s statue to be pulled down any more than I want the Purple Heart that he established to be ripped off my chest. I never said that I did.”
The 45 senators contacted by the Daily Caller include Cory Booker, Chris Coons, Dianne Feinstein, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, and Chuck Schumer, among others.
The call to remove statues depicting historical figures, including Washington, who was a slave owner, comes as the country embarks on a renewed conversation about race sparked by the death of George Floyd.
Peaceful protests and riots have spread across the country since Floyd’s death on Memorial Day while he was in police custody. The protests were formed to denounce racism and police brutality, but some have led to the vandalism and destruction of statues demonstrators deemed racist.
Statues depicting figures from the Civil War were initially targeted during acts of vandalism, but other statues of Christopher Columbus, President Abraham Lincoln, and others have also been targeted.
Trump has denounced the destruction of statues repeatedly.
“Angry mobs are trying to tear down statues of our founders, deface our most sacred memorials, and unleash a wave of violent crime in our cities,” the president said during remarks at Mount Rushmore over Independence Day weekend. “The American people are strong and proud, and they will not allow our country, and all of its values, history, and culture, to be taken from them.”
