The Rewriting of History: Pramila Jayapal’s Claim About Who Built America

Let’s start with the claim.

“The majority of Americans know that this country was built by Somalis, Indians, Latinos and Africans.”

Read that again. Let it land. Pramila Jayapal, a Democratic congresswoman from Washington, just made a statement about American history. A statement about who built this country. A statement about the people whose labor, whose sacrifice, whose vision created the United States of America.

She did not mention the Pilgrims. She did not mention the Founding Fathers. She did not mention the waves of European immigrants who crossed the Atlantic, who cleared the land, who built the cities, who fought the wars, who established the institutions that have made America what it is.

She mentioned Somalis. Indians. Latinos. Africans.

Not as contributors. Not as part of the story. As the builders. As the people who built this country. As the primary architects of the American experiment.

She did not say that immigrants from all over the world contributed to building America. She said that “the majority of Americans know” that the country was built by these specific groups. Somalis. Indians. Latinos. Africans. Not Europeans. Not the traditional immigrant groups that came in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Not the people who actually built the infrastructure, the economy, the institutions.

Somalis. A country that has produced fewer than 200,000 immigrants to the United States. Indians. A country whose mass migration to America began after the 1965 immigration reforms. Latinos. A group whose significant presence in the United States is largely a phenomenon of the last fifty years. Africans. A continent whose immigration to America was minimal until the late twentieth century.

These are not the people who built America. They are not the ones who cleared the forests, who laid the railroads, who built the factories, who fought the wars, who wrote the Constitution, who established the rule of law. They are recent arrivals. They are part of the story. They are not the builders.

Jayapal is rewriting history. She is erasing the people who actually built this country and replacing them with the constituencies that vote for her. She is telling a story that is not true. She is telling a story that is designed to serve a political agenda. She is telling a story that insults the memory of the millions who came before and did the actual work of building America.

The Builders

Who built America? The answer is complicated. It is not simple. It is not the story of any one group. It is the story of many groups, many peoples, many waves of migration.

First, the Native Americans. They were here first. They built civilizations, cultures, societies. They were displaced, decimated, destroyed by the Europeans who came after. They built something. It was taken from them.

Then, the Europeans. The English, the Dutch, the French, the Spanish, the Germans, the Irish, the Italians, the Poles, the Jews, the countless others who crossed the Atlantic in search of freedom, opportunity, a better life. They cleared the land. They built the cities. They fought the wars. They wrote the Constitution. They established the institutions. They built the industrial economy. They built the modern United States.

Then, the Africans. They did not come willingly. They were brought in chains. They were enslaved. Their labor was stolen. They built the agricultural economy of the South. They built the wealth that made the industrial revolution possible. They built America, but they were not allowed to share in the benefits. Their story is one of forced labor, of exploitation, of resistance. They built America, but they were not the builders. They were the built.

Then, the Asians. The Chinese, the Japanese, the Filipinos, the Koreans, the Indians. They came in waves, starting in the nineteenth century. They built the railroads. They worked the fields. They started businesses. They faced discrimination, exclusion, internment. They built America, but they were not always welcomed.

Then, the Latinos. The Mexicans, the Puerto Ricans, the Cubans, the Dominicans, the Central and South Americans. They came in waves, starting in the twentieth century. They worked the fields, the factories, the service economy. They built communities, businesses, families. They built America, but they were not always seen as American.

The story is complicated. It is not the story that Jayapal tells. She has simplified it. She has reduced it. She has made it about the groups that support her politically. She has erased the Europeans. She has erased the founders. She has erased the millions who came before the recent waves of immigration.

That is not history. That is propaganda.

The Erasure

Jayapal is not just rewriting history. She is erasing it. She is erasing the people who actually built this country. She is erasing the Pilgrims, the Puritans, the Quakers. She is erasing the Founding Fathers, the Framers, the signers of the Declaration. She is erasing the pioneers, the settlers, the homesteaders. She is erasing the immigrants from Ireland, from Italy, from Germany, from Poland, from the countless European countries that sent their sons and daughters to build a new world.

She is erasing them because they do not fit her narrative. She is erasing them because they are not the constituencies that vote for her. She is erasing them because they are white. She is erasing them because their story does not serve the political agenda of the Democratic Party.

She is not alone. The left has been erasing European Americans from the story of America for years. They have been telling a story of oppression, of exploitation, of victimhood. They have been telling a story that centers on the suffering of non-white groups and minimizes the contributions of white groups.

The story is not true. It is not complete. It is not fair. It is a distortion of history. It is a lie.

Jayapal is telling that lie. She is telling it to a audience that wants to hear it. She is telling it to an audience that will not question it. She is telling it to an audience that will repeat it. She is telling it to an audience that will use it to justify policies that discriminate against the very people who built this country.

She is not a historian. She is a politician. She is telling a political story. She is not interested in the truth. She is interested in power.

The Majority

Jayapal says that the “majority of Americans know” that the country was built by Somalis, Indians, Latinos, and Africans. That is not true. The majority of Americans do not know that because it is not true. The majority of Americans know that the country was built by Europeans, by Africans who were enslaved, by Asians who came later, by Latinos who came later still. The majority of Americans know that the story is complicated, that it cannot be reduced to a list of groups, that it cannot be twisted to serve a political agenda.

Jayapal is not speaking for the majority. She is speaking for a minority. A vocal minority. A minority that has convinced itself that it is the majority. A minority that has convinced itself that its narrative is the only narrative. A minority that has convinced itself that anyone who disagrees is a racist, a bigot, a white supremacist.

The majority of Americans are not fooled. The majority of Americans know that the country was built by many groups. The majority of Americans know that the story of America is not the story of any one group. The majority of Americans know that Jayapal is wrong.

She is entitled to her opinion. She is not entitled to her own facts. The fact is that the country was not built by Somalis, Indians, Latinos, and Africans. The fact is that those groups have made contributions, but they are not the builders. The fact is that the builders were primarily Europeans, with significant contributions from Africans who were enslaved, and later contributions from Asians and Latinos.

The fact is that Jayapal is lying. She is lying to serve a political agenda. She is lying to energize her base. She is lying to rewrite history.

The majority of Americans know this. They are not fooled. They will not be fooled. They know who built this country. They know who their ancestors are. They know the truth.

Jayapal can tell her story. She cannot make it true.

The Last Word

Pramila Jayapal said that “the majority of Americans know that this country was built by Somalis, Indians, Latinos and Africans.” She is wrong. The country was built by many groups, primarily Europeans, with significant contributions from Africans who were enslaved, and later contributions from Asians, Latinos, and others.

She is erasing history. She is erasing the people who actually built this country. She is replacing them with the constituencies that vote for her. She is telling a story that is not true. She is telling a story that is designed to serve a political agenda.

The majority of Americans are not fooled. They know their history. They know their ancestors. They know who built this country. They know that Jayapal is wrong.

She is entitled to her opinion. She is not entitled to her own facts. The facts are clear. The history is clear. The builders of America were many. The groups she listed were not the builders. They are part of the story. They are not the story.

Jayapal is rewriting history. She is telling a lie. She is doing it to serve a political agenda.

The majority of Americans know the truth. They are not fooled. They will not be fooled. They will remember who built this country. They will honor their ancestors. They will reject the rewriting of history.

Pramila Jayapal can say whatever she wants. She cannot change the past. She cannot erase the people who actually built this country. She cannot make her story true.

The truth is the truth. History is history. The builders of America are the people who actually built it. Not the people who arrived yesterday. Not the people who are part of a political coalition. Not the people who are being used to rewrite history.

The builders are the people who came before. They are the ones who deserve to be remembered. They are the ones who deserve to be honored.

Jayapal is dishonoring them. She is erasing them. She is replacing them with a fiction.

The majority of Americans know the truth. They are not fooled. They will not forget.

The truth will outlive the lie. History will outlive the rewriting. The builders will be remembered.

Jayapal’s words will be forgotten. They are not true. They are not history. They are not worth remembering.

The builders are worth remembering. They are the ones who built this country. They are the ones who deserve our gratitude. They are the ones who will never be erased.

Not by Pramila Jayapal. Not by anyone.