Tammy Duckworth Fires Back at Tucker Carlson in Op-Ed

'These titanium legs don't buckle'
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 10, 2020 6:11 AM CDT
Tammy Duckworth Fires Back at Tucker Carlson in Op-Ed
Sen. Tammy Duckworth departs the Capitol, late Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2020.   (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Tucker Carlson has stepped up his attacks against Sen. Tammy Duckworth in recent days, calling her a moron, a coward, and a vandal and challenging Duckworth's patriotism after she expressed openness to a "national dialogue" about the complicated legacies of American founders. In a blistering New York Times op-ed, the Democrat says that while she would go to war to protect Carlson's right to say offensive things on TV, she wants to set the record straight. "I don’t want George Washington’s statue to be pulled down any more than I want the Purple Heart that he established to be ripped off my chest. I never said that I did," writes Duckworth, who lost both legs fighting in Iraq. "But while I would risk my own safety to protect a statue of his from harm, I’ll fight to my last breath to defend every American’s freedom to have his or her own opinion about Washington’s flawed history."

She says the Fox host—and President Trump—are targeting her because they want to divide the nation and distract attention from the administration's failures. "It’s better for Mr. Trump to have you focused on whether an Asian-American woman is sufficiently American than to have you mourning the 130,000 Americans killed by a virus he claimed would disappear in February," she writes. "They should know, though, that attacks from self-serving, insecure men who can’t tell the difference between true patriotism and hateful nationalism will never diminish my love for this country—or my willingness to sacrifice for it so they don’t have to," she writes. "These titanium legs don’t buckle." She urges Americans to remember Washington's warning in his farewell address to "guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism." Click for the full piece. (Earlier this week, she challenged Carlson to "walk a mile in my legs.")

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