An incumbent South Carolina Republican lawmaker is under fire after resurfaced videos show his apparent support for diversity, equity, and inclusion in the halls of Congress.
In the newly resurfaced videos from 2021, Rep. William Timmons, R-S.C., is heard touting his support and promotion of DEI in a hearing titled, "Recruiting, Empowering and Retaining a Diverse Congressional Staff."
"Since the establishment of this committee, we have made staff retention and diversity a top priority," Timmons said. "When we talk about modernizing Congress, we don’t just mean updating the technology in the House but investing in and developing a talented and diverse workforce that accurately reflects the communities we represent."
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Timmons argued that DEI should influence the hiring process in Congressional members' offices and that "every member’s office should be representative of the people they represent."
"I want to start with an objective. So, in my mind, our objective should be that every Member’s office — well, let’s start with Congress," the South Carolina Republican said. "Congress should be representative of the country, and then within Congress, every Member’s office should be representative of the people they represent."
"So it should be diverse based off of race, gender, geography, socioeconomic background, lifestyle, and it should be proportional based off of the population they represent," Timmons said. "Can we start there?"
Following the resurfaced video, Timmons' wrote on Saturday on X that the clips were "selectively edited and taken out of context." When Fox News Digital reached out to Timmons' office for comment, a spokesperson directed attention to the tweet.
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"Something we should all be able to agree on is that Congress would be better served if the staff wasn’t made up of the children of DC insiders who grew up in the Swamp. Someone from the Upstate of South Carolina should have the same opportunity to serve in our nation’s capital as someone from Arlington, VA," Timmons wrote.
"The 2019 ModCom recommendation (which passed unanimously) has nothing to do with 2024 DEI," Timmons said. "The purpose of the recommendation has been warped by former Speaker Pelosi and woke Democrats, and our Republican majority has now appropriately defunded it in this year’s budget."
Timmons said that he has "always advocated" for hiring based on ability.
"I have always advocated for hiring the best and brightest, which is clearly not the same as implementing quotas," he said. "I fully believe DEI is anti-American, and have opposed it every turn. I will continue to push back on the radical left’s woke agenda."
Timmons' challenger and South Carolina State Representative Adam Morgan told Fox News Digital that his opponents' apparent DEI support is "appalling" and "anti-American."
"It’s appalling that my opponent, an alleged Republican, is in support of anti-American indoctrination and racist affirmative action quotas — and even wants taxpayers to fund it," Morgan said.
"Meanwhile, I’ve been working to get this leftist indoctrination out of classrooms and to cut funding from universities that push these discriminatory practices. He’s everything wrong with the swamp. The difference between us is stark — he works for the Left, I oppose them."
