In a moment that should’ve melted even the iciest political heart, 13-year-old Devarjaye “DJ” Daniel—a Texas boy battling brain cancer with a warrior’s spirit—stood in the Capitol gallery Tuesday night, beaming as President Donald Trump named him an honorary U.S. Secret Service agent. Diagnosed in 2018 with a grim five-month prognosis, DJ has defied the odds, undergone 13 brain surgeries, and chased his dream of becoming a cop with relentless grit. The House chamber erupted in cheers, chants of “DJ! DJ!” echoing off the walls as Republicans leapt to their feet. Secret Service Director Sean Curran handed him a badge, and the kid hugged him like he’d just won the Super Bowl. It was raw, real, and undeniably human.
But guess who didn’t budge? The Democrats.
That’s right—while the room roared for a child who’s stared death in the face and smiled, most of the Democratic lawmakers sat stone-faced, hands glued to their laps, refusing to stand or clap. X posts lit up with outrage: “Shame on @TheDemocrats… they kneel for a drug-addicted smack head but won’t stand for a terminally ill child,” one user fumed. Another called it “a cold, calculated display of disdain.” Even Roseanne Barr, never one to mince words, took a sledgehammer to the moment: “I thought USAID was the final nail in the Democrat coffin—tonight was,” she tweeted, slamming their refusal to honor DJ as the ultimate low blow.
And here’s the kicker: this is the same party that can’t stop preaching about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). They’ll hoist the DEI flag at every rally, pat themselves on the back for “compassion,” and lecture America about uplifting the marginalized—yet when a Black, cancer-stricken kid from Houston gets his moment of glory, they’re suddenly too busy checking their nails to care. The hypocrisy is so thick you could choke on it.
Fox News reported that while a lone Democrat, Rep. Laura Gillen from New York, did stand to applaud, the majority of her party stayed seated, their silence louder than any protest. Trump supporters like Ric Grennell and Clay Travis pounced: “A terminally ill child with brain cancer gets an award, and Democrats refuse to clap—truly sick people,” Travis wrote. Meanwhile, Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) tried to spin it to Daily Caller, claiming Democrats “respect people who are sick”—a weak defense that crumbled faster than a house of cards in a hurricane.
Critics on the left, like MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, didn’t help their case. Maddow called Trump’s gesture “disgusting,” accusing him of using DJ as a “political prop.” DJ’s father, Theodis Daniel, wasn’t having it. “She needs to shut her mouth if she has nothing nice to say,” he told the New York Post, defending his son’s moment against what he called Maddow’s “bad energy.” Kyle Kulinski on X echoed the prop narrative, but it’s hard to buy when DJ himself, in a Fox & Friends interview, glowed with gratitude: “It’s the biggest honor of them all.”
So what’s the real story here? Are Democrats so blinded by their Trump Derangement Syndrome that they’d rather snub a dying kid than give the man a win? Or is this just another chapter in their DEI charade—loud on slogans, quiet on action? Posts on X lean hard into the former: “They hate Trump so much they couldn’t stand for a kid fighting cancer,” one user raged. “Out of touch and no humanity,” another piled on.
The optics are brutal. A party that’s spent years branding itself as the champion of the underdog just turned its back on one—and not just any underdog, but a Black child whose story screams resilience. If DEI means anything, shouldn’t DJ Daniel be its poster child? Instead, they left him hanging, proving that when push comes to shove, their “inclusion” might just be a buzzword for the cameras.
As DJ hugged Trump in the Oval Office the next day, sporting his Houston PD uniform and a grin wider than the Potomac, the contrast couldn’t be starker. Republicans chanted his name; Democrats couldn’t be bothered. Maybe Barr’s right—tonight wasn’t just a nail in the coffin. It was a whole damn shovel.
