'What is a Uyghur?': GOP presidential candidate appears ignorant of major human rights crisis

Republican presidential candidate and Miami Mayor Francis Suarez on Tuesday appeared to express ignorance of one of the world's most significant human rights crises during an appearance on "The Hugh Hewitt Show."

Suarez announced his candidacy earlier this month, pitting himself against former President Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and a bevy of other presidential hopefuls.

The Miami mayor discussed his campaign with Hewitt during the Tuesday media hit. He appeared to flub one of the final questions, however. Hewitt asked "Will you be talking about the Uyghurs in your campaign?"

"The what?" replied Suarez, prompting Hewitt to reiterate: "the Uyghurs."

"What's a Uyghur?" was his response, prompting Hewitt to advise the Republican to educate himself on the issue.

The Uyghurs are a Muslim-majority Turkic ethnic group indigenous to China's northwestern Xinjiang province, which the natives refer to as East Turkestan.

The communist government in Beijing has waged a years-long campaign to exterminate the minority group through mass incarceration, forced labor, forced sterilization, and relocation. The U.S. believes China has detained at least 3 million members of the minority group in a vast network of more than 1,200 concentration camps, which the country claims are merely "vocational training" centers.

Escapees, however, have testified to egregious human rights abuses, including forced abortions and sterilizations, systemic rape, torture, forced education in Mandarin, and communist indoctrination.

In light of Suarez's expressed ignorance of the matter, Uyghur Project representative Julie Millsap offered to arrange a meeting between Suarez and her organization to educate him on the matter.

At the end of the radio hit, Suarez promised Hewitt that he would research the Uyghurs, saying, "I will talk about, I will search Uyghurs. I’m a good learner. I’m a fast learner."

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on Twitter.