On Fox News, Jenna Ellis Rives, a Trump 2020 advisory board member, attacked Democrats for passing a bill increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour as “anti-American.” She complained, “The minimum wage should be zero.”
The minimum wage discussion came during a longer discussion about the 2020 presidential election. Although Rives criticized Trump’s racist “go back” attack on four Democratic congresswomen of color known as “The Squad,” Rives seemed just fine with the McCarthyism that went with it. In fact, she suggested the McCarthyism spewed at Rep. Ilhan Omar and the three other members of The Squad should expand to any Democrat with a progressive economic message.
Rives said about Trump, "What he's campaigning on is pro-American. The Democrats haven't come out with any sort of platform other than anti-Trump."
Guest Nathan Rubin, of Millennial Politics, nicely called out the rhetoric: "You very cleverly slipped in how President Trump is pro-American and Democrats are not,” Rubin said. “I know a lot of Democrats. We all love this country, we’re all patriotic." It’s too bad he didn’t call out how much Trump hates America, while posturing as a patriot.
However, Rubin noted that even during the middle of the so-called feud between Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi and The Squad, the Democratic House of Representatives passed a “Raise the Wage” bill. As Rubin explained it, the bill provides that "anyone making less than $15 an hour full time, that bill would elevate their wages to $15 an hour.”
Rives interrupted. “But that’s fundamentally anti-American. That’s against capitalism,” she claimed. “If you look at our capitalist system, the minimum wage should be zero."
Rather than allow Rubin to challenge that comment, host Neil Cavuto interrupted to say he didn’t want to get into “a minimum wage argument” and changed the subject back to the 2020 election.
Watch the attack on a minimum wage below, from the July 20, 2019 Cavuto Live.
In fairness to the Archie Bunker Trump crowd sometimes liberals play this game. But by all objective truth it’s largely a fundamental right-wing meme they constantly lean on as a crutch to agitate their intolerant (and ignorant) base.
We can debate the merits of a minimum wage, to cite this example, but Jenna Ellis Rives prefers to shut down debate by declaring it “un-American”. Which leaves her claiming real red blooded Americans believe paying people zero wages is pro-American. The irony is the MAGA whiners think they’re so economically abused but will grab their nearest flag to wave to signal their support for the worst possible employee abuse.
The appropriate response is to note that Rives is simply repeating Right Wing propaganda talking points, to note that without a minimum wage, millions more Americans would be unable to eat or would be dependent on food stamps, and to note that the Right Wing is not the friend of the Middle or Working class anyway, given that they skyrocketed taxes on Middle Class employees while giving themselves and the rich a huge tax cut last year.
