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USA Today as well as The Hill reported that Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, claimed China is “to blame” for the spread of the coronavirus.
Specifically, Cornyn blamed China because it has a “culture where people eat bats and snakes and dogs and things like that.”
“These viruses are transmitted from the animal to the people and that’s why China has been the source of a lot of these viruses like SARS, like MERS, the Swine flu, and now the coronavirus, so I think they have a fundamental problem,” the Texas Republican said to reporters.
Cornyn said he did not object to a geographic name for the virus as President Trump refers to it as “Chinese virus.”
When asked about whether the term was racist, Cornyn said, “I disagree. We’re not talking about Asians.”
“We’re talking about China, where these viruses emanate from and created this pandemic,” he added.
Sen. John Cornyn: "China is to blame because the culture where people eat bats & snakes & dogs & things like that, these viruses are transmitted from the animal to the people and that's why China has been the source of a lot of these viruses like SARS, like MERS, the Swine Flu." pic.twitter.com/N4TIlGFqAL
— The Hill (@thehill) March 18, 2020
More from USA Today:
The CDC says the coronavirus has its origins in bats and might have jumped to humans through a “wet market,” or a live animal market in Wuhan, China.
Swine flu was first detected in the United States in 2009, and MERS was first identified in Jordan in 2012, according to the CDC. The CDC says the first cases of SARS were reported in China’s Guangdong province in 2002.
Princeton University historian Kevin Krus responded, “Yiiiiiiiiikes.”
Democratic attorney and politician Bakari Sellers criticized Cornyn, tweeting, “Can we go back to when being racist in public wasn’t cool?”
Rep. Judy Chu, D-Calif., the chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said Cornyn’s comments aer “disgusting.”
“Disparaging an entire ethnic group and culture like this is bigotry, plain and simple,” Chu added.
“Blaming Chinese people en masse for the spread of this disease is the exact same bigoted line that was used to justify the Chinese Exclusion Act over a century ago,” Chu continued.
@JohnCornyn, there are over 1M Asian Americans in your state. These are wildly irresponsible comments when anti asian hate crimes are on the rise.
— NCAPA #AAPI2020 (@NCAPAtweets) March 18, 2020
The World Health Organization’s guidance for naming infectious diseases cautions against naming diseases for locations or people like the West Nile virus or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome.
Whether the virus originated in China is not in serious dispute, despite some attempts by Chinese officials to sow disinformation about the virus’ origins. A USA TODAY fact check found claims the virus originated elsewhere “false.”
