House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) came under GOP fire online after warning U.S. athletes attending the Olympic Games in Beijing against speaking out on China’s human rights abuses.

After warning U.S. athletes participating in the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing not to “speak out” against the abuses of the “ruthless” Chinese government, the 81-year-old Pelosi received significant backlash from Republican lawmakers.

“Speaker Pelosi doesn’t want to upset the Chinese Communist Party,” wrote House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). “So she’s warning US Olympians to stay silent about China’s atrocities.”

“No surprise this comes right as Democrats are trying to jam through the 3,000-page ‘America Concedes Act’ that helps China but hurts America,” he added.

“Why did Nancy Pelosi stand by as BLM protesters set fire to cities but tell American athletes to stop protesting China’s human rights violations?” asked Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN).

“Hey @SpeakerPelosi don’t tell American citizens to worry about upsetting the Chinese Communist Party’s fragile feelings,” wrote Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL).

“Pelosi can bend the knee to China. But our American athletes have free speech rights and should never be told to surrender them,” wrote Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA).

“First Jen Psaki tells a private corporation to engage in censorship. Then Nancy Pelosi tells athletes in the Olympics to not speak out against China. Two blatant infractions against the First Amendment only days apart,” wrote Florida congressional candidate Willie J. Montague.

“They’re getting a little brazen here, don’t you think?” he added.

“Speaker Pelosi said people ‘will do what they do’ when it came to protests and ripping statues down in our cities, yet won’t stand up for U.S. Olympic athletes speaking out against China,” wrote Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC) .

“We should ALWAYS have Americans’ backs over China,” he added.

“The U.S. should be BACKING UP athletes using their freedom of self-expression to expose the Beijing communists for the murderers they are, NOT telling them to hide,” wrote Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (R-FL).

“Americans [don’t] cower to communists,” he added. “We defeat them.”

“Americans fight for freedom and defend the voiceless,” wrote Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK). 

“[I]f our athletes can’t display those American values while representing @TeamUSA in the Olympics, why are we there at all?” he added.

“This is despicable. We cannot allow the #CCP to walk all over us,” wrote Rep. Michelle Steel (R-CA).

“It is unacceptable that we’ve put our athletes in this position,” she added.

“Outrageous that the Speaker finds it necessary to ask American athletes not to acknowledge the CCP’s mass genocide of the Uyghur Muslims and their use of slave labor,” wrote Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA).

“Pelosi is a CCP bootlicker who deserves nothing but contempt,” wrote senatorial candidate Jake Bequette.

“Pelosi tells American athletes to shut up and dribble at the Genocide Games,” he added in another tweet.

On Thursday, speaking at Congressional-Executive Commission on China hearing, Pelosi said the U.S. has an “urgent moral duty to shine a bright light” on China’s human rights abuses.

However, despite scolding the International Olympics Committee (IOC) for turning a blind eye to China’s “decades-long campaign of abuse and repression” of which “we cannot and will not be silent,” Pelosi urged the U.S. athletes attending the games to compete rather than criticize the “ruthless” Chinese government.

“I would say to our athletes: you are there to compete,” she said. “Do not risk incurring the anger of the Chinese government because they are ruthless.”

“I know there is a temptation on the part of some to speak out while they are there; I respect that,” she added. “But, I also worry about what the Chinese government might do to their reputations, to their families.”

The hearing on Thursday was reportedly orchestrated “as a platform for Pelosi and several activists to highlight China’s human rights record, including reports of forced labor and acts of genocide against the Uyghur ethnic community in the Xinjiang region as well as suppression of democratic protests in Hong Kong and religious repression of Tibet’s Buddhists,” according to Bloomberg News. 

Rep. Jim McGovern, the Democrat in charge of the committee, said “no athlete” would willfully choose to compete in a genocidal country.

“If given a choice, I believe no athlete would want to compete in a country committing genocide and crimes against humanity,” he said. “But that is what they are forced to do because of the feckless IOC and its corporate sponsors.” 

Follow Joshua Klein on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.