Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert is not backing down from a derogatory comment she made about a Democrat colleague who disrupted President Donald Trump’s address to Congress last week.
Instead, she’s doubling down, writing on social media that. “I stand by what I said!”
What Boebert said was “pimp cane” in referencing Rep. Al Green, a 77-year-old Black congressman from Texas, who shook his cane at the president before being removed from the chamber.
That phrase has led to a censure resolution against her.
When asked about the incident during an interview with Real America’s Voice last Wednesday, Boebert said for Green to “go and shake his pimp cane at President Trump was absolutely abhorrent.”
The House, including 10 Democrats, voted two days after the speech to censure Green for his protest.
But at least one of the Democrats who condemned Green’s disruption thinks Boebert’s use of “pimp cane” is abhorrent enough to warrant the same rebuke.
Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania introduced a censure resolution against Boebert Monday, saying her words were “disparaging, derogatory, and racist toward another colleague, and are a breach of proper conduct and decorum” of the chamber. The resolution is unlikely to advance in the Republican-controlled House.
Asked about her original remark Tuesday night on Real America’s Voice, Boebert said, “If that gold-plated cane isn't a pimp cane, I don’t know what is.”
Boebert went on to say, “It was a little slide to his cane and his gesture … if she wants to censure me over it, go ahead and try, girlfriend. I have the American people who will show up, who will donate, and who will reelect me.”
Boebert also shared an image during the interview of her dressed in a purple fur coat and silver cane, joking that would be her outfit of choice if the censure resolution moved forward.
Boebert mispronounced Houlahan’s last name in the interview, calling her “hula whatever” or “hula hoo” and accused the Democrat of bringing out the censure resolution to deflect attention from attacks she’s getting from the Democratic base for voting to censure Green.
In introducing the resolution, Houlahan said Boebert’s words were racist and derogatory and she wanted to make sure House Speaker Mike Johnson enforced House rules equally.
“Rules are rules. Congresspeople take an oath and agree to a set of rules when we are sworn in to serve our constituents. When those rules are ignored, it is a disservice to our constituents and a danger to our democratic institutions. Those still matter,” she said in a statement.
Boebert heckled former President Joe Biden during his 2022 State of the Union address, shouting at him about the withdrawal from Afghanistan while he spoke about servicemembers dying from exposure to toxic burn pits. While her behavior drew criticism from some Republicans, she was not removed from the chamber or censured.
This is not the first time Boebert has been accused of mocking her colleagues with racial stereotypes. In her first term, a Democrat introduced a resolution to remove the firebrand from her committee assignments after she joked about Rep. Ilhan Omar being a suicide bomber.
Back then, Boebert apologized for her words, but not to Omar.
Boebert barely won reelection after her first term in Congress and moved to the more conservative 4th Congressional District last year. The controversial lawmaker won there by a smaller margin than the district’s predecessors.
