Cross was responding to “Princess” Meghan McCain complaints about Sens. Mazie Hirono and Tammy Duckworth demanding better representation of Asian Americans in the Biden administration.
Earlier in the week, McCain “asked” on The View whether the lack of Asian representation on that show meant one of them should lose her job. “Is identity politics more important than qualifications of a job?” Sen. John McCain’s daughter asked.
The word “scathing” barely does justice to Cross’ commentary. She said McCain’s “talent as far as I can tell is finding great Black hairstylists and benefitting from nepotism.”
Yes, someone should lose her job, Cross said. “I’ll give you two guesses, but you’ll only need one.”
She went on to play a montage of McCain repeatedly invoking her father. “But yes, let’s talk identity politics,” Cross added sarcastically. “Just like with hairstyles, Meghan, we’ve watched you take it, twist it, braid it and lock it so it benefits the warped presentation of your own clumsy and ill-informed thoughts.”
Cross pointed out that “identity” and “politics” are pretty much inseparable already. MAGA voters are described as having “white economic anxiety” and other white voters have gotten “cute little nicknames like ‘Joe the Plumber’ or 'soccer moms' or ‘NASCAR dads.'” But every other voting bloc is only identified by race.
Then Cross really let McCain have it:
It's called projection when one unconsciously ascribes traits that you don't like about yourself and attribute them to someone else. Like, I don't know, if my only talent was who I was related to, I may assume that everyone else had some similar, unfair advantage, you know?
But try being an ally instead of an adversary because, just so you know, in 2020, over 11 million Asian-American Pacific Islanders were eligible voters and those who did cast ballots played a huge role in electing President Biden.
So the same way spoiled little, gun-toting, faux-Christian narcissists get to make demands of their chosen politicians so, too, do those of us who helped pave the way for this administration. The latest data we could get our hands on show that Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders are barely 3% of the broadcast media workforce, yet they are the fastest growing demographic in the country and represent nearly 6% of the population.
Everyone deserves to see themselves reflected in this space and as someone who grew up yearning to see my lived experience reflected back to me and then had to crawl, claw and fight at every turn to take up space in broadcast media, I simply ask, how dare you? From now on, I hope you speak less and listen more and take a little time to enjoy this view.
