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Top Pentagon official pressured to recite racist tweet from diversity chief, agrees it’s ‘not acceptable’

March 24, 2023 | | Print Article

The Pentagon’s Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness was forced by House Republicans to read a blatantly racist, anti-white tweet made by his former diversity, equity, and inclusion chief and explain why no disciplinary action would be taken against her.

Kelisa Wing had posted several divisive tweets about white people and how best to handle them, sparking an investigation into her behavior.


(Video: YouTube)

Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) was keen on having Gil Cisneros, a Biden-appointed official, read one of them out loud before the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday.

“Mr. Cisneros, are you familiar with the tweet?” she asked. “Can you please read the tweet aloud?”

Cisneros dutifully read the post verbatim.

“So exhausted at the White folks in these PD sessions,” Wing wrote. “This lady actually had the caudacity to say Black people can be racist, too. I had to stop the session and give the Karen the business. We are not the majority. We don’t have power.”

“This is wildly inappropriate and unacceptable,” Stafanik stated. “Do you agree with that, Mr. Cisneros?”

“I do agree that that is not acceptable,” he conceded. “It’s not condoned by… the Department of Defense.”

Wing has in the past vowed to “tear down the system” in education and has voiced her belief that it was time for a “racial reckoning” and “revolution,” according to Fox News Digital (FND).

In a letter sent on Thursday to Stafanik’s office, the Pentagon said Wing will face no disciplinary action for her divisive actions.

According to Cisneros, the Pentagon “determined the employee was speaking in a personal capacity… As a result, the Director, DoDEA took no disciplinary action.”

Rather, he revealed, Wing was “reassigned to another position that does not include diversity, equity and inclusion-specific responsibilities” as “part of headquarters restructuring.”

Rep. Matt Gaetz wasn’t about to let Cisneros go without a good grilling from him.


(Video: YouTube)

“I would like to go back to the tweets of the racist person that works for you,” he told Cisneros. “What does ‘Caudacity’ mean?”

“I have no idea,” he replied.

“You took six months to investigate one tweet,” Gaetz shot back. “You didn’t even figure out what the words meant?”

Despite having been named by the Pentagon as the one who was responsible for determining the outcome of the investigation into Wing, Cisneros claimed he wasn’t involved in the actual probe.

That, too, made Gaetz suspicious.

“Someone at the Pentagon is throwing your name out there as being responsible for this? And now it looks foolish that you’re suggesting you don’t know what that means,” he pressed.

“You said in a Fox News Digital article that you were going to take 30 days to investigate, and it took you six months, in a six-month investigation you guys didn’t learn what the word ‘Caudacity’ meant?'” he continued. “I think, you know. I think every person that’s going to watch this exchange knows, you know, it’s she’s trying to lash audaciousness with someone being Caucasian, isn’t she?”

“I have no idea,” Cisneros repeated. “We do not support racist tweets. We do not support racism.”

“Well, did you fire this lady?” Gaetz asked.

“I did not hire her,” Cisneros replied.

Playing dumb seemed to be Cisneros’ strategy throughout the hearing.

When asked by Stefanik if he’d read any of Wing’s Critical Race Theory-infused children’s books — including one titled “What is White Privilege?” — the official stated that he hadn’t, adding that he didn’t know the so-called “antiracist” collection was in Department of Defense schools.

“I’m telling you they are,” Stefanik stated. “That’s why I asked you the question. You should know. You’re a DoD official. I’m informing you. You should know the answer.”

She then informed Cisneros of Wing’s advertising of her books in a government meeting and asked him if he was “aware that this is illegal for DoD employees to advertise and promote their personal books, that they will profit off of those sales?”

“I’m not aware of that,” he said. “But I can look into it, and I’ll get back to you.”

“You seem to not know a lot of what’s happening in the department,” Stefanik noted. “So my expectation is that we’ll continue educating you on what’s happening in the Biden administration, Department of Defense. But this is absolutely unacceptable. We expect that report and I will take it as a result that we delivered, making sure that she should have been fired completely, but she was at least moved somewhere else, not dealing with our kids’ educational system.”

Melissa Fine
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