Sen. Josh Hawley said the current Republican Party is not ready for what he described as "the great awokening" by the left, which he said is trying to "purge Christianity" from modern culture.
"Marriage, the family, the very idea of gender. They want to purge Christian and any kind of Bible influence from our culture. This is the great awokening that the left has gone through," said Hawley, R-Mo., in a Thursday speech at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C.
"The great awokening that they want to force on this nation and my contention to you today is that the Republican Party as we have known it for the last 30 years is not prepared to face it," Hawley said.
"The Republican Party as we know it must be reformed," Hawley continued. "The question is, can we as conservatives do what we must to see the party perform, to see it stand up to meet the challenges of this hour?"
Hawley invoked former President Ronald Reagan, whom he said also had to "transform" his party in his day, and implied that the "new world order" politics left over from President George H.W. Bush must be changed.
"The politics of ‘new world order’ have failed. They have failed our people, they have failed our party," Hawley said. "The pursuit of economic globalism has failed. The pursuit of liberal empire has failed. It has cost us shocking sums of money."
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"It has fueled the rise of our most serious adversary, China," Hawley continued, who also leveled criticism of the creation of the World Trade Organization.
"We will [surely] look back at the decision to create the World Trade Organization in its current structure – and to admit China to the WTO and to give China permanent, most-favored nation status – is one of the most colossal errors any global power has made in its history. And certainly it's one of the biggest the United States has ever made," Hawley said.
Hawley went on to suggest that "new world order" politics has harmed middle-class Americans while promoting foreign enemies.
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"China has built its military on the backs of our middle class," he said.
Hawley also added that Marxist influence in the United States is eroding the middle class.
Hawley said that those who care about the future of the Republican Party "must move it immediately to higher ground."
"Let's restore the economic and cultural power of the working people in the nation. That's how we're going to save our culture," Hawley said.
