President Donald Trump continued his tradition this week of going after his opponents with blatant lies, asserting on Twitter for all the world to see that Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) harbors “tremendous hatred of Israel and the Jewish people.” Tlaib’s fellow Muslim Congresswoman Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) is among those who’ve had enough.
In response to Trump asking people to imagine “what would happen if I ever said what she said, and says,” Omar shared on Twitter:
‘You praised people at a neo-Nazi rally. We don’t have to imagine. This is another transparent attempt to sow division b/t minority communities and distract from your own criminal behavior by smearing a Muslim woman. No one should fall for it this time.’
It’s true — following a gathering of white nationalists in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 that ended with one counterprotester dead and others injured, Trump insisted there were “very fine people” on both sides of the incident, which has struck very many people as outlandishly out of line. Whether or not the president of the United States stands against white nationalists and their allies as a rule shouldn’t even be a question according to some of the most basic standards of American politics — but here we are.
On plenty of other occasions, he has made his opposition to minority communities known in more concrete ways. He’s asserted that letting immigrant groups into Europe that include many Muslims is “very, very sad,” and domestically, he’s insisted without any sort of comprehensive evidence that asylum seekers arriving at the southern border are a threat who should be confronted with a wall and even the force of the U.S. military.
Omar has personally faced the brunt of this racist antagonism before. Trump targeted her after she praised those who recognized that only “some people did something” when the 9/11 terror attacks took place and the whole Muslim community in the U.S. or elsewhere was not somehow responsible. Trump tweeted a video interspersing those remarks with footage from the attacks themselves — and following that, death threats targeting the Congresswoman sparked significantly.
His latest attack on Tlaib is based on an utter lie. He and other Republicans have grossly misrepresented her remarking that she felt “calm” thinking about what Palestinians provided to the Jewish people following the Holocaust. Trump, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.), third-ranking House Republican Rep. Liz Cheney (Wy.) and others have asserted Tlaib was saying the Holocaust itself was “calming.” That’s false, period.
Check out Twitter’s response to Omar. The trolls really descended.
Featured Image via screenshot
