'Unconstitutional and Discriminatory': GOP State Governor Drops the Hammer on Race-Based Contracting
By Mike MillerEver notice how most, if not all, of the awful things Democrats accuse Republicans of doing is blatant projection, as if they're looking in the mirror while engaged in hypocritical scolding? Of course, you have.
This article is a perfect example of one of those ironic instances.
South Carolina Republican Governor Henry McMaster on Wednesday moved to eliminate race-based government contracting in the Palmetto State, pushing state lawmakers to codify his executive action into law. McMaster signed an executive order directing state agencies to stop awarding contracts based on race.
McMaster wrote on X:
Today, I have ordered state agencies to halt all future spending, procurement or contract decisions that are based on race. The state laws requiring these quotas and racial set-asides are unconstitutional and discriminatory. Business with state government should be awarded based on merit and value to the taxpayer. Senate President Alexander and House Speaker Smith have agreed to lead the effort to repeal these laws when the General Assembly returns next month.
Current South Carolina law requires all state agencies to allocate a minimum of 10 percent of spending to minority-owned businesses. Moreover, South Carolina’s Department of Transportation is also required to commit a minimum of five percent of its spending for certain contracts to minority-owned businesses.
That, my Democrat friends, is straight-up racism.
Slice it and dice it anyway you want, Democrats, but this is yet another example of the Left's faux utopian dream of placing so-called "equity" ahead of merit.
Before we proceed with the story, let's be clear:
Everything — and I mean everything — the Democrat Party supports or opposes can be connected to the ballot box (in their minds, that is) with no more than two dots. And I'll go as far as to suggest without exception.
Here's more:
In his executive order, McMaster said that the state laws mandating race-based contracting “call for unlawful racial discrimination” and that they are policies that “rest on the false assumption that the solution to perceived historical wrongs is to racially discriminate against individuals in the present.”
South Carolina Senate President Thomas Alexander and House Speaker Murrell Smith, both Republicans, said they’ll act in January to back McMaster’s move and make his ban on race-based contracting permanent in state law. Here's Alexander:
We are a nation and a state dedicated to the principle that ‘all men are created equal, endowed by their Creator,’ as reflected in the Constitution’s requirement of equal protection of the laws. When existing laws no longer align with that constitutional command, it is our duty to correct them. I am confident my colleagues in the Senate share my belief that state government must reflect equality under the law in all its endeavors and ensure our statutes fully comply with the Constitution.
Boom.
I'm reminded of the famous scenario in George Orwell's Animal Farm where the pigs painted "All animals are equal" on the front of the barn, only to later ominously add, "but some animals are more equal than others."
It didn't work in Animal Farm, and it doesn't work in America. Where merit doesn't trump (no pun intended) "equity," failure, if not disaster, ultimately follows.
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