Pa.’s Rep. Summer Lee really showed up and showed out last week on Capitol Hill

Can I please get a thumbs-up for Pennsylvania’s own U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, who has been making her home state proud?

I’m impressed with how the Democratic congresswoman from the 12th Congressional District, which encompasses most of Pittsburgh, has been standing strong against the Trump administration. In March, Lee introduced a resolution calling for the impeachment of then-Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Earlier this month, Lee squared off against Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during a House Committee on Education and Workforce hearing on the issue of the Black maternal mortality rate.

I was glad to see it, because that’s an important topic that doesn’t get talked about nearly enough. Black mothers are three to four times more likely to die during childbirth than their white counterparts. Many of these deaths can be prevented. Yet, instead of allocating additional resources to address this public health crisis, the Trump administration is cutting federal programs designed to address it.

Enter Lee, the first Black woman elected to represent the Keystone State in Congress, and a member of the Squad, a progressive group of Black and brown Democratic lawmakers that includes U.S. Reps. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. Lee is just 38 years old, but already making a name for herself in national politics by demanding the release of the unredacted files of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

I like the fact that Lee has a backbone and doesn’t suffer fools gladly — just ask U.S. Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, who had the audacity to accuse her of “bitching” during a closed-door meeting with Bondi, according to a social media post by CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins. He wouldn’t have said that about a white male colleague.

I chuckled when I read how Lee clapped back by accusing him of being “too basic to answer simple questions without throwing a temper tantrum.” She also called him “weak” and “a failure.”

Kennedy also caught it from her. If you haven’t seen the video of Lee’s public takedown of the HHS secretary, then take a moment and see it for yourself. Every time I watch it, I find myself getting fired up all over again.

Kennedy, a notorious anti-vaxxer and promoter of baseless conspiracy theories, is no match for Lee, a quick-talking, Howard University-trained attorney. During last week’s congressional budget hearing, he managed to come off as even more odd and unqualified than he usually does — and that’s really saying something.

Seemingly having trouble hearing at times, Kennedy tried feebly to push back against Lee’s onslaught by claiming that overall maternal health outcomes have greatly improved under President Donald Trump. “It helps everybody,” Kennedy said.

That’s when Lee shot back crisply, “It does not help everyone.” Black maternal outcomes require different interventions. Otherwise, the statistics, she pointed out, wouldn’t be what they are.

Lee also called out the Trump administration’s demonization of diversity, equity, and inclusion — which even prevents researchers and scientists from exploring differences in mortality rates across racial and ethnic populations — and asked Kennedy, “Do you have an idea of how we can solve the Black maternal mortality crisis if we can’t say Black?”

That led Kennedy down a mumbo jumbo rabbit hole of claiming that DEI is to blame for racial divisiveness and polarization — which we all know is utter nonsense.

Institutional racism and white supremacy have plagued this country since even before its inception. Trump doesn’t like to display any history that documents that, but the fact is that even President George Washington enslaved Africans. Other presidents did, too; others were staunch segregationists.

America didn’t suddenly become polarized because of DEI — which, in actuality, helped white women move up in corporate America more than it aided people of color. Lee’s pushback against Kennedy’s testimony hopefully helps people understand that color blindness doesn’t erase the existing racial disparities in health outcomes.

“[Lee’s] comments were really important because it brings it out of this framing of DEI and into the framing of public health,” Saleemah J. McNeil, founder of the Oshun Family Center in Jenkintown, pointed out. McNeil, who began advocating on behalf of mothers after experiencing her own traumatic birth experience, added that “this isn’t a race problem,” but an issue of public health.

Kennedy would understand that if he were even remotely qualified to serve in the position he’s in. Instead, he personifies everything DEI pushes back against. Kennedy has zero medical background and absolutely no business running the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I think his late father and his uncle, the late President John F. Kennedy, would both be thoroughly disgusted.

As she wrapped up her questioning, Lee asked Kennedy about having denied saying on a podcast in 2024 that “every Black kid is now just standard put on Adderall, SSRIs [selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors], benzos [benzodiazepines], which are known to induce violence” and needed to be rehomed.

He tried to explain his unsubstantiated claim away before Lee interjected, asking, “Are you going to rehome them?”

Kennedy denied saying he would — and mercifully, for him, his time on the hot seat under Lee’s intense cross-examination was up. It was time to move on.

But I can assure you Kennedy hasn’t heard the last from her — and for that, we should all be grateful.