Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, spent years playing footsie with anti-Semites and white nationalists. Despite hailing from a Union state, King once kept a Confederate flag on his office desk, insinuated support for the white genocide conspiracy theory, and endorsed a neo-Nazi in the Toronto mayoral election. The typical Republican response involved a bit of hand-wringing, a few terse words, and then a change of subject. But King finally went beyond the pale of plausible deniability in the past few months, referring to Mexicans as “dirt” while campaigning for re-election and then infamously asking why “white supremac[y]” was “offensive.”
It may have been too late, but it certainly wasn’t too little, as the GOP finally put its foot down and held King’s to the fire. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., yanked every last committee assignment from King, granting an effective green light to an emerging crop of Republicans aiming to primary King in the 2020 election.
The Democratic Party now faces its own question. Freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., whom the Left has deemed a rising star in the progressive wing of the party, said the quiet part out loud, yet again.
Responding to a report of McCarthy promising “action” against Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., and Omar for their anti-Semitic dog whistling and support of boycott, divestment, and sanctions policies punishing Israel, Omar commented on Twitter, “It’s all about the Benjamins baby.”
Hackneyed Puff Daddy reference aside, Omar’s insinuation, that McCarthy is sensitive about anti-Semitism only because that’s where the money is, echoes old anti-Semitic stereotypes and tropes about a global Jewish banking conspiracy. We know this to be true because Omar said as much, blaming the American Israel Public Affairs Committee specifically for bribing pro-Israel politicians. AIPAC, as a lobby group, doesn’t make direct campaign contributions.
Democrats could ignore her 2012 tweet accusing Israel of “hypnotiz[ing] the world” as poor wording from before her candidacy. They could justify her blatant campaign lie that she wouldn’t support BDS with the fact that, unlike Tlaib, she hasn’t affirmatively supported the total eradication of the state of Israel. And they could pretend that she didn’t get chummy with Linda Sarsour and a radio host who once compared Hamas to victims of the Holocaust.
To their credit, plenty of Democrats have finally spoken up. The Democratic House leadership issued a statement lambasting Omar’s comments as anti-Semitic and called upon her to apologize.
But this raises two questions:
1. What happens if Omar refuses to apologize?
2. More importantly, why is an apology enough?
Remember, the GOP leadership, belatedly, took real action against King, stripping him of committee slots and all but inviting a primary challenge.
It’s long past time for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to kick Omar off the House Foreign Affairs committee, censure the congresswoman, and condemn not just Omar’s words, but the growing strain in the Democratic Party of overt hatred towards the very notion of a Jewish state.
The “fresh faces” are simply out of control, and Pelosi must get the House back in order.
