WASHINGTON – At a Senate hearing on hate crimes, U.S. Sen. John N. Kennedy repeatedly suggested the head of a Muslim civil rights group supports terrorism and, despite her repeated denials, told her to “hide her head in a bag” — drawing calls Wednesday for censure from an Arab-American association.
During the hearing, Maya Berry, executive director of the Arab American Institute, a nonpartisan civil rights representing about 3.7 million Arab Americans, said three times that she didn’t support terrorist groups such as Hamas, but also offered that it was disappointing a senator would suggest she might simply because she was of Arab descent and Muslim.
“Hamas is a foreign terrorist organization that I do not support,” Berry said.
Robert McCaw, government affairs director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Wednesday he’s recommending that the civil rights advocacy organization seek a U.S. Senate censure of Kennedy for his comments Tuesday during the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, which was titled “A Threat to Justice Everywhere: Stemming the Tide of Hate Crimes in America.”
“Politicians and the media have long and falsely pictured all Arabs and all Muslims as supporting terrorists,” said McCaw, who added that he left the hearing early in anger over the lack of respect shown Berry.
“Senator Kennedy was weaponizing one of the most hateful anti-Arab, anti-Muslim tropes,” he said.
At one point in the hearing, Kennedy asked Berry, “you support Hamas, do you not?”
As audience members began shouting in disapproval of the question, Berry responded: “Sir, I think it's exceptionally disappointing that you're looking at an Arab American witness before you and saying, ‘you support Hamas.’ I do not support Hamas or any …"
Kennedy interrupted saying, “You know what's disappointing to me? You can’t bring yourself to say … you don’t support Hamas. You don’t support Hezbollah. You don’t support Iran.”
As Berry tried to answer, Kennedy said, “You should hide your head in a bag.”
He repeatedly cut off her answers, saying his time to question her was "limited."
Hamas-led militant groups launched an Oct. 7 surprise attack on Israel that killed 1,139 people, almost all of whom were civilians. Hezbollah is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and paramilitary group.
When asked Wednesday about the possibility of a censure and to discuss his questioning of Berry, Kennedy said to make an appointment with his office. His office did not respond.
Written testimony of Maya Berry
Sen. Dick Durbin, the Illinois Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary committee, gave Berry an opportunity to respond to Kennedy’s questioning.
“It’s regrettable that as I sit here, I experience the very issue that we’re attempting to deal with today,” Berry said later in the hearing. “The introduction of foreign policy is not how we keep Arab Americans, Jewish Americans, Muslim Americans or Black people, or anybody, safe. This has been regrettably a real disappointment but very much an indication of the danger facing our democratic institutions.”
Dr. Charles Boustany, a Lebanese American who represented Acadiana in Congress from 2005 to 2017, said he was appalled by Kennedy’s questioning.
“The fact of the matter is it was disgraceful. He displayed a high degree of ignorance. You know, I get the performative nature of it, but that was uncalled for,” said Boustany, who was defeated by Kennedy in the 2016 Senate campaign.
Boustany added about Berry: “I know her quite well and she’s a very honorable person and a very smart person. Very knowledgeable about Middle Eastern issues as well as Arab American relations and so forth, she’s a very well-informed person.”
Durbin’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about a possible censure. But during the hearing, Durbin said “public officials on both sides of the aisle have the responsibility not to fan the hatred.”
Bob Mann, a retired LSU journalism professor who had worked for U.S. Sens. Russell Long and John Breaux, both Louisiana Democrats, said Kennedy should be censured.
"Joseph McCarthy was censured for the same type of questioning,” Mann said.
“If you have evidence that she has sympathies for Hamas and Iran, then he should present that evidence and ask her to explain,” Mann said, adding that just asking the question without evidence amounts to smearing the witness.
McCarthy was a Republican senator from Wisconsin who in the 1950s attracted attention by questioning, without proof, whether various officials were connected to the Communist Party.
“It seems we have a lot more appetite for that kind of rhetoric now,” said G. Pearson Cross, a political science professor at the University of Louisiana Monroe. “Is Kennedy going to pay a price for that rhetoric? Not in Louisiana.”
Louisiana has an estimated 24,700 Muslim residents, according to the Association of Religion Data Archives.
Randal Gaines, who chairs the Louisiana Democratic Party, issued a statement condemning Kennedy’s questioning of Berry.
“It is absolutely shameful that a United States senator told a civil rights leader to ‘hide her head in a bag,’” Gaines said.
Kennedy was not the only Republican senator on the panel to cut off Berry.
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina asked each witness if the goal of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran is to destroy the Jewish state.
Berry responded that Graham’s questions were about complicated international issues, not about hate crimes.
Graham interrupted: “That’s the most ridiculous testimony ever given in this committee. If you think it’s complicated to figure out that Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran want to kill all the Jews, I should not listen to anything else you’ve got to say. And I won’t.”
Graham criticized the Judiciary committee’s Democratic majority for expanding the hearing to hate crimes and not focusing solely on antisemitism at universities.
Republicans have made an election-year issue about the Israeli war against Hamas-controlled areas of Palestinians. Many of the university protests have criticized Israel over the number of Palestinian civilians killed.
Republicans say that Jewish students need protection on university campuses.
“Does anyone doubt that if the Klan was on college campuses terrorizing African American students, threatening African American students, that we would see the FBI there?” said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas. “But when it comes to antisemitism, the Democrats have a problem.”
Stephanie Grace of The Advocate | The Times-Picayune contributed to this report.