On Wednesday, supporters at President Trump’s rally in North Carolina erupted in chants of “send her back,” calling for Ilhan Omar to be sent back to her birth country of Somalia. The widely-condemned chants came after a slew of online attacks from President Trump, beginning with a Twitter screed on Sunday telling the “Progressive Democratic Congresswomen” to “go back” to their home countries.
Trump has denounced the controversial “send her back” chant, telling White House reporters, “I disagree with it … I was not happy about it.” But his comments fall on deaf ears, seeing that he let the chant go on during his rally without any attempt to quell it. Trump’s supporters showed their support for him — and loudly. It was a low blow, and just the latest excuse for liberals to label Republicans as bigoted.
It’s a shame that it has come to this. After all, where the Democratic Minnesota representative was born is completely irrelevant — or, at least, it should be.
Omar has been a United States citizen since 2000. For a while, some Republicans have been questioning if her arrival in the United States was legal, but here’s the bottom line: Omar has been recognized as a United States citizen. Calling for her deportation — aka “send her back” — simply because of her views is absolutely horrific. Besides, it’s foolish line of attack, since there are plenty of actual substantive criticisms of Omar to be made.
Take, for example, Omar’s history of making anti-Semitic comments. In February, she accused the American Israel Public Affairs Committee of bribing members of Congress to support Israel, tweeting that “it’s all about the Benjamins baby,” and playing into a classic anti-Semitic trope. Just this week, she proposed a resolution challenging the U.S. ban on boycotts against Israel, likening the boycotts to “boycotting Nazi Germany.” The irony there, of course, cannot be overstated.
And there’s plenty in Omar’s progressive policy agenda that’s ripe for Republican criticism. She supports a government takeover of healthcare via so-called Medicare for All, tuition-free college, student debt forgiveness, and increased gun control. Every single one of these policies is antithetical to the Republican Party platform, and offers ample ground for fair criticism.
But instead of focusing on these highly-questionable policies, some Republican arguments have centered around nativist chants and racism. This bizarre laser focus on her heritage isn’t a good look. Some supporters of the president — and the president himself — have even outlandishly suggested that Omar might be a supporter of al-Qaeda.
The argument that Omar is “anti-American” is fundamentally flawed. Like most refugees, she came here for a better life. Even if you disagree with many of her policies, as I do, she repeatedly emphasizes that her plans for change are borne out of a love for the nation that adopted her.
So rather than encourage more moderate right-leaning voters who may share the GOP’s policy views to vote in their favor, the party is shooting itself in the foot with its anti-Omar rhetoric. The racially-charged attacks from the president and the North Carolina rally distract from any valid debate on the merits of Omar’s politics.
With both presidential and congressional elections fast approaching in 2020, Trump’s crowd needs to tread lightly. The right will try to win in 2020 by casting the Democrats as socialists. But what kind of insult is “socialist” to a moderate who sees the Republican Party as racist?
Omar is a U.S. citizen, and Trump’s GOP must stop with the low-blow attacks.
Jordan Lancaster is a contributor for Young Voices and a senior political science major at Wake Forest University.
