‘It’s Embarrassing That The New York Times Is Doing This’: Conservatives React To The NYT ‘1619 Project’

Some conservatives and journalists are hitting back at The New York Times following its “1619 Project” that “aims to reframe the country’s history” and suggests America’s “true founding” was when the first slaves arrived.

The “1619 Project” is made up of numerous stories and poems about slavery and racism in America. Some conservatives have condemned the project.

The project includes an essay by journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones on Aug. 14 suggesting “our democracy’s founding ideals were false when they were written.”

“The 1619 Project is a major initiative from The New York Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery,” the project reads. “It aims to reframe the country’s history, understanding 1619 as our true founding, and placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of the story we tell ourselves about who we are.”

Former Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich tweeted Sunday that “The NY Times 1619 Project should make its slogan ‘All the Propaganda we want to brainwash you with’.it is a repudiation of the original NY Times motto.”

Gingrich went on Fox News Monday and discussed the project as well, calling it “a lie.”

“There were a lot of other things going on. There were several hundred thousand white Americans who died in the civil war in order to free the slaves,” Gingrich added. “The fact is I saw one reference that The New York Times claims that the American revolution was caused in part to defend slavery. That is such historically factually false nonsense that it’s embarrassing that The New York Times is doing this.”

Gingrich also mentioned a leaked NYT town hall meeting where Executive Editor Dean Baquet “‘basically said, ‘look, we blew it on Russian collusion, didn’t work. Now we are going to go to racism, that’s our new model,’” according to the former speaker.

“This is a tragic decline of the NYT Times into a propaganda paper,” he said.

Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted the project did not sound like news.

Ben Domenech, co-founder and published of The Federalist, dismissed some of the quotes from the project as false, writing “no.”

Benjamin Weingarten, a senior contributor at The Federalist, suggested the 1619 Project was intended to “delegitimatize America.”

“Contrary to its stated goals, it appears the purpose of the 1619 Project is to delegitimize America, and further divide and demoralize its citizenry,” he wrote Sunday.

The “1619 Project” will be publishing more stories in the upcoming weeks.