Rep. Ro Khanna has long been one of the most grating figures in the Democratic caucus, and his latest performance on Capitol Hill showed precisely why many conservatives see him as a caricature of the modern progressive left.
The California Democrat, who already raised eyebrows with his tortured defense of Maine Senate nominee Graham Platner amid allegations of physical abuse and controlling behavior, managed to outdo himself during a Thursday hearing of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.
As reported by RedState, Khanna previously insisted that voters should believe Platners accusers and not attack them, while simultaneously urging them to believe Platner himself because the man who reportedly explicitly sexted up to a dozen women after his November 2023 marriage had supposedly redeemed himself.
That kind of logical pretzel-twisting set the stage for Khannas latest debacle, this time on an issue far more central to national security: Chinas economic espionage and subnational influence in the United States.
The committee convened to examine Chinas Economic Espionage and Subnational Influence in the United States, a topic that should have prompted sober, bipartisan concern rather than partisan theatrics.
One of the Republican witnesses, Michael Lucci, founder and CEO of State Armor, appeared to testify on a range of threats tied to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), including the national security implications of Chinese-linked birth tourism.
Khanna, the committees ranking Democrat, used his questioning time not to probe the CCPs activities, but to launch a personal attack on Lucci by dredging up an old tweet and branding him an anti-Chinese racist.
The tweet in question read: Two Chinese-Americans accused of attempted bombing at MacDill Air Force Base gained US citizenship via birthright. They are not loyal to the USA. There are 1,500,000 more Chinese Americans essentially born in Saipan and raised in Communist China. Denaturalize them all.
Rather than engage with the underlying concern about foreign adversaries exploiting American citizenship laws, Khanna chose to interpret the tweet as evidence of bigotry. Yet, as Lucci calmly pointed out, the accusation collapsed under the most basic scrutiny, because not only is he married to a Chinese woman, but his four children are half Chinese and his in-laws are Chinese as well.
Lucci later summarized the absurdity of Khannas attack in a pointed social media post that quickly went viral among conservatives.
Ro Khanna massively embarrassed himself today. Instead of discussing policy, he accused me of anti-Chinese racism. My wife is Chinese. My 4 children are half Chinese. Whats Ro Khanna? 100% clown.
In a longer statement, Lucci expanded on what had transpired in the hearing room and why he believes Khanna owes more than just him an apology. My response to @RepRoKhanna's self-immolation in committee today: Ro Khanna owes the American people an apology. I've testified in 20 state capitols across the country. I've never seen a lawmaker embarrass himself like Ro Khanna did today.
Lucci stressed that Khanna is not some backbencher, but a leader of the most important committee for countering the Chinese Communist Party.
Instead of dealing in substance and policy, he pulled out the race card in the most self-embarrassing way today while also peddling ridiculous conspiracy theories, Lucci wrote, underscoring how identity politics is being weaponized to shut down legitimate debate on national security.
According to Lucci, his testimony focused on concrete, documented threats to American sovereignty and safety.
Here's what happened: I testified today about how American state lawmakers are being threatened, harassed and attacked by Chinese state-tied actors. Our military installations are being closely surveilled. Chinese-Americans are being hunted down by CCP government agents. Critical infrastructure is being attacked.
Yet Khanna, Lucci said, chose to ignore all of that, including threats against Democrats currently serving in state legislatures. Rep. Khanna ignored all those threats, *including threats to fellow Democrats who are currently sitting state lawmakers.* Honestly, I'm shocked that it did not register with him that a Chinese company threatened a Democrat state official. Instead, Ro dug up a tweet where I criticized CCP birth tourism and tried to call me racist.
Of course, he completely failed, Lucci added, arguing that Khannas gambit backfired both factually and politically. Lucci explained that his opposition is not to Chinese people, but to a specific tactic used by CCP elites to secure U.S. citizenship for their children while raising them in loyalty to Beijing.
I oppose birth tourism schemes through which CCP military and political leaders get U.S. citizenship for their children by giving birth in Saipan and then raising their children loyal to the CCP in China, he wrote. It's completely crazy that we allow this. @peterschweizer has documented this scandal in his recent book. This shouldn't be a partisan issue.
Lucci then laid out the immediate context that appeared to have triggered Khannas ire. And here's the context: Ro was angry that I criticized birth tourism as a part of my criticism of two Chinese-Americans who attempted to bomb MacDill Air Force Base earlier this year. According to Rep. Khanna, the bombers Alen Zheng (20) and his sister Ann Mary Zheng (27) achieved American citizenship through some sort of birthright program. It's unclear whether they were just born and raised here, or if they were a part of the Saipan scheme I criticized.
But either way, Ro Khanna was lifting up and defending people who were basically terrorists who tried to bomb CENTCOM March 10th of this year, Lucci continued, highlighting the moral inversion at work when a member of Congress appears more offended by criticism of birth tourism than by an attempted attack on a major U.S. military installation. Then he turned around and claimed the real problem is racists who think birth tourism is a bad idea.
Lucci noted that his position on birth tourism is not some fringe view held only by hardline conservatives. Guess who thinks birth tourism is a bad idea? 75% of the American people according to a YouGov poll from last year: The group Americans are least likely to say should automatically receive U.S. citizenship of the nine asked about in the survey is children born in the U.S. to parents who are tourists visiting the country. 25% of Americans, including 11% of Republicans and 41% of Democrats, think children born to tourists on American soil should automatically receive U.S. citizenship.
Sorry 75% of Americans who have common sense. @RepRoKhanna thinks you're all racists! he wrote, driving home how detached Khannas rhetoric is from mainstream public opinion. For conservatives who have long argued that the left uses accusations of racism as a blunt instrument to silence dissent, Khannas performance served as a textbook example.
Lucci further emphasized that the CCP-linked birth tourism he is warning about often involves individuals who have no meaningful connection to the United States beyond the accident of birth on U.S. soil or a U.S. territory. Furthermore, with the CCP, we are talking about cases where a child in simply born on a U.S. pacific island and then returns to China within days, never to see the USA again. Ro Khanna apparently thinks giving citizenship to all of these people is a great idea, even if they are completely loyal to the CCP, absolutely hate the USA, and have never stepped foot in our country.
To me and to practically anyone with common sense who analyzes the CCP, this is an obvious vector for CCP grey-zone political warfare, Lucci warned. For example, imagine 1,500,000 CCP loyalists raised entirely in China voting across swing states in our elections.
Nonetheless, Ro Khanna went on a rant to claim that I'm an anti-Chinese racist because I oppose this obviously ridiculous birth tourism scheme, he said, underscoring how Khannas fixation on identity politics obscures the strategic threat. The episode, in Luccis telling, revealed more about Khannas priorities than about any supposed prejudice on Luccis part.
Lucci also took time to describe his own family background, which Khanna apparently never bothered to research before leveling his accusations. Now here's where Ro really jumped the shark. In his rush to conjure up a triple bank-shot conspiracy theory to try to claim I'm a racist, he apparently didn't do any homework to find out anything about me.
I'm married to an immigrant from China who became an American citizen in 2019. We have 4 wonderful children who are, of course, half Chinese by ethnicity, Lucci wrote. Ro was ranting at the dais claiming I'm racist against my own family simply because I oppose all the various schemes of the genocidal Chinese Communist Party, and I hold a position on birth tourism shared by 75% of the American people. And I bet it would be way higher than 75% if the question was focused on the CCP Saipan scheme.
As I told Ro in committee, calling someone an anti-Chinese racist for opposing the CCP is like calling someone an anti-Italian racist for opposing the mafia. Both examples are absurd. Embarrassingly so, he added, offering an analogy that neatly captures the difference between criticizing a hostile regime and attacking an ethnic group.
For conservatives, that distinction is fundamental: opposing communism, especially a regime engaged in genocide and global subversion, is not bigotry but moral clarity.
Lucci stressed that his organization, State Armor, is focused on practical solutions to real threats, not on partisan point-scoring.
The American people need real leaders and real national security solutions from both federal and state governments. That's what we work on every day at @StateArmor.
We don't need @RepRoKhanna wasting time be-clowning himself in committee when there is so much real work that needs to be done, he said, arguing that Khannas antics actively undermine the committees mission. In Luccis view, Khannas behavior is part of a broader pattern of unseriousness and extremism.
Ro insulted me and my family today. But honestly, I don't know anyone who puts any value in what Ro says. So that doesn't really matter, Lucci wrote, dismissing the personal slight while zeroing in on the institutional damage. Today's self-embarrassment was just one more part of Ro's ongoing self-immolation that includes endorsing Nazi-sympathetic candidates, claiming @elonmusk killed millions of kids, and being one of the most prolific stock traders in Congress. And that's just in the last few weeks.
But here's what matters: Ro Khanna is an elected official who is tasked with dealing with our most urgent national security issues, like those I brought before him and the @ChinaSelect committee today, Lucci concluded. And instead of engaging in a real policy discussion, he destroyed our ability to work together on real solutions to counter the attacks by the Chinese Communist Party.
For that, he owes the American people an apology, Lucci declared, framing the issue not as a personal grievance but as a failure of leadership at a time of mounting geopolitical danger. Any day when Ro Khanna's arguments can get so thoroughly demolished is a good day. Thursday was a good day.
Login