How Thanksgiving Became Political: Francesca Hong’s Tweets Explained
New York Times · LC · trust 36/100
Ahead of Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor, a past tweet by the assemblywoman that called for the holiday to be canceled was resurfaced.
Listen · 5:01 min Share full article 1 In recent years, many schools have been rethinking how they teach students about Thanksgiving. Credit... Vincent Alban/The New York Times By Alisha Haridasani Gupta
So when Hong narrowly lost to her opponent David Crowley on Tuesday, some in the political world pointed to Thanksgiving . Or rather, a six-year-old, now-deleted social media post from Hong dismissing the cherished American holiday and saying it glorified colonialism.
“Cancel Thanksgiving,” she wrote in the post on X. “Should have done this in 1621.”
Though a number of factors led to the election’s outcome, and as establishment Democrats have pushed the party to focus on courting moderates , Hong’s comment on the holiday sent political pundits and strategists into a frenzy. A debate ensued around whether reframing the quintessential American holiday was too radical an idea in the current political landscape.
Hong’s comment resurfaced in the days leading up to the election in a swing state and came alongside her other takes on almost every holiday: She also seemingly dislikes Valentine’s Day, the Fourth of July and Halloween and using Christmas trees as computer screen backgrounds.
All of which became rich fodder for her political opponents and the right-wing media, feeding into Republicans’ longstanding gripe that liberals, with their progressive interpretations, are ruining all holidays. The conservative National Review magazine named Hong the “Grinch of all holidays” and Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, claimed on X that Democrats like Hong “openly hate America.”
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