A top House Republican has a stark message for anyone who criticizes America: “You can go to Europe.”
Representative Lisa McClain of Michigan, who serves as the House Republican Conference chair, raved about the rights afforded by the American democratic system, and then told people who favor communism to get out in an interview with Newsmax Thursday.
“The Constitution is the envy of the world. People risk their lives to come to America because of what we have — capitalism. We have a democracy. We have freedom of speech. We have love of country,” she said on the National Report.
“For the people in our country, who want to turn this country into a communist country. Leave. You’re free to leave. The beauty about America is, you can leave!” McClain said. “Go to Europe where they’re experiencing this heat wave and they don’t have any air condition[ing]. See how well that works for you.”
Europe, where only about 20 percent of homes have air conditioning, has seen more than 1,300 deaths from high temperatures since June 21, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, chief of the World Health Organization, wrote on X Sunday.
“I’m proud to be an American,” McClain continued. “Why aren’t we celebrating the greatest nation on Earth?”
Only about four in 10 US adults said they felt proud about the 250th anniversary of America’s independence on July 4, an AP-NORC survey released last month found.
Commonly misstated as communism, democratic socialism has gained prominence with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s electoral victory last November.
The New York Times described democratic socialism in an article last summer as “an ideology rooted in its opposition to capitalism and wanting to shift power to workers from corporations.”
Some of the key campaign promises Mamdani made were to freeze rent for stabilized units and to make buses free.
Two democratic socialists whom Mamdani backed in the June primaries in New York, Darializa Avila Chevalier and Claire Valdez, also won their races.
A newly released Pew Research Center survey found that about a third of Democrats like political leaders who identify as democratic socialists.
While that may help democratic socialist candidates in a primary election, they could face a steeper challenge in the general election.
The same Pew Research Center survey, conducted in January, found that Americans overall tend to dislike more than like democratic socialist politicians.
