Laura Ingraham’s defense of iconic ‘MAGA’ hat sparks media outrage

As a group of students from Covington Catholic High School learned last month while visiting the Lincoln Memorial, wearing one of President Donald Trump’s trademark Make America Great Again baseball caps is a sure way to invite unsupported accusations of racism and bigotry.

But Fox News host and conservative podcaster Laura Ingraham challenged that characterization during her cable news show on Thursday. In a monologue that sent the mainstream media establishment into a tizzy, Ingraham lamented that wearing a MAGA hat “is basically considered a hate crime,” and asked her viewers to don the iconic headwear as a symbol of “tolerance, kindness, and inclusiveness.”

“I would continue to wear them whenever and wherever you like,” Ingraham said. “And when doing so, be sure to show everyone around you what true tolerance, kindness, and inclusiveness looks like.” Take a look at Ingraham’s stunning monologue:

“Of course it’s racist”

Thanks to a steady stream of heavily-biased news reports, organized liberal protests, and Hollywood taunts, the left has successfully convinced a plurality of Americans that the president is racist. A March poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research determined that 57 percent of Americans believe that Trump is racist.

And while the AP poll may seem like a bad sign for Trump, the president is certainly not alone. A Survey Monkey online poll conducted in early November found that 61 percent of U.S. adults who identified as Democratic believe that all Republicans are racist, bigoted, and sexist.

The left’s demonization of mainstream conservatism was aptly explained by African-American author and social polemicist Shelby Steele, who said in a clip from Ingraham’s podcast on Thursday: “The Democratic Party and liberalism generally in America has been completely dependent on fighting some large American evil, some menace in American life that then justified them taking power — and those menaces are fading.”

Indeed, this is the world that American progressives currently inhabit. A place where, Ingraham notes, Democrats seek “to brand an entire belief system as immoral, evil, toxic, and of course it’s racist.”

The conservative menace

Apparently, this mentality extends all the way to campaign apparel, as well. Following the Covington Catholic controversy — wherein the liberal media jumped to conclusions and vilified a teenage boy whose only crime, it turned out, was wearing a MAGA hat — many Democrats doubled down on their disparaging analysis instead of asking for forgiveness. Liberal actress and activist Alyssa Milano even alleged: “The red MAGA hat is the new white hood.”

Later, a Newsweek article attacked Ingraham for taking exception to the wholesale branding of the conservative movement as a bigoted ideology. Contributor David Brennan pointed to the appearance of MAGA hats at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charleston, VA, where a counter-protestor was killed as justification for labeling the president’s campaign slogan as a symbol of hate.

Brennan even pointed to the Lincoln Memorial stand-off to explain why Trump supporters — half of all Americans — deserve the criticism. He failed to acknowledge that the slander the Covington Catholic student endured was undeserved.

Colorblind politics

Still, much to Dems’ dismay, MAGA policies are working “by any objective analysis,” Ingraham pointed out. “And they’re not scary, and they’re not racist, and they’re not anti-woman, and they’re not anti-immigrant.”

“Not only is this conservative agenda working,” Ingraham added, “it’s working really well for minorities.” Indeed, the president has helped to create conditions where a record number of minorities are employed.

Besides Trump’s colorblind economic expansion, the president also recently signed off on prison and sentencing reform that will help right a justice system that has disproportionately harmed minority communities.

With that, Republicans should be proud to publicly showcase their support for the president’s agenda. In a just world, the MAGA hat would be viewed as a symbol of resilience, self-assurance, and prosperity for all. Unfortunately, Democrats have convinced their constituents otherwise.