Supporters at President Trump Donald John TrumpDozens of British lawmakers stand behind 'Squad' amid Trump attacks #IStandWithIlhan trends after crowd at Trump rally chants 'Send her back' 'Racism' top search after Trump rally: Merriam Webster MORE’s campaign rally on Wednesday chanted “send her back” about Rep. Ilhan Omar Ilhan OmarBen Carson: Trump is not a racist and his comments were not racist Trump thanks 'vicious young Socialist Congresswomen' for his poll numbers House expected to vote Wednesday on Green's impeachment effort MORE (D-Minn.) after the president launched into a diatribe against the first-term lawmaker and Somali refugee.
Trump tore into Omar early on in his rally in Greenville, N.C., a continuation of his days-long attacks against her and three other progressive minority congresswomen. The crowd raucously booed Omar at the first mention of her name.
The president went on to accuse Omar of demeaning U.S. service members and minimizing the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
“She looks down with contempt on the hard-working Americans saying that ignorance is pervasive in many parts of this country,” Trump said.
The crowd then broke into a chant of “send her back” in reference to Omar, who came to the U.S. as a Somali refugee as child.
Crowd at tonight's Trump rally in North Carolina breaks out into chants of "Send her back!" as the president attacks Rep. Ilhan Omar pic.twitter.com/0q5L39W61h — Jon Passantino (@passantino) July 17, 2019
The president has in recent days targeted Omar and Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), claiming the lawmakers "hate our country" and suggesting they should leave rather than complain about the government.
He sparked an uproar on Sunday morning when he tweeted that progressive congresswomen "who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe" should "go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came."
All four are U.S. citizens, and only Omar was born outside the U.S.
The president has ratcheted up his criticisms even as Democrats and some Republicans alike condemned his original tweets as racist. The House voted Tuesday to condemn Trump over the tweets.
The crowd reacted negatively at the first mention of Omar’s name, and the furor intensified after a protester appeared to cause a scene.
“He goes home to mommy now and he gets reprimanded,” Trump said of the demonstrator as they were escorted out.
The president went on to reference a years-old video clip in which Omar lightheartedly recounted the tone of voice a professor would use to talk about al Qaeda. The clip resurfaced in a Fox News report earlier this year.
Trump also alluded to Omar's comments about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which some perceived as minimizing the event.
“CAIR was founded after 9/11 because they recognized that some people did something, and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties,” Omar said earlier this year in a speech to the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
Omar responded to the chants on Twitter roughly an hour later by quoting the poem "Still I Rise" by Maya Angelou.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
-Maya Angelou https://t.co/46jcXSXF0B — Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) July 18, 2019
undercity_huckster on July 18th, 2019 at 00:31 UTC »
This was obvious the minute he sent those tweets: it wasn't an accident or a poor choice of words, this is the Trump 2020 campaign message. He has nothing to offer voters at his rallies, no ideas, no plan for what he would improve with another 4 years or how. There's no intention of winning over any new voters - he believes whipping his base into an explicitly racist frenzy is his best shot at winning. And we have a long way to go to the election, this is only to get more and more awful.
NormalGap on July 18th, 2019 at 00:22 UTC »
What a terrible time for race in America.
A major senate candidate said he’d still vote for the President from his party even if he straight up said “I’m a racist”
A former Louisiana Governor attacked a civil right hero, and right hand man to MLK, for “being a proud member of the slavery party”.
The sitting president told women of color in the house to go back to their countries.
One of the presidents closest advisors asked a Jewish reporter what his ethnicity was.
At the sitting presidents rally his supporters chanted “send her back” when he referenced a sitting member of congress who is a naturalized citizen.
All in like 3 days.
AK1RA07 on July 18th, 2019 at 00:15 UTC »
With all the shit that's already gone wrong recently, this is the most disappointed I've been with this country; to listen to the chants and watch Trump say nothing...I'm heartbroken for her, and embarrassed for us.