The House voted Thursday to kick Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar off the House Foreign Affairs Committee, a decision that Republicans vowed to take because of Omar’s history of antisemitic and anti-American remarks.
The resolution was approved in a 218-211 vote after a heated debate in which Democrats accused Republicans of racism and hypocrisy and claimed that the GOP is only policing Democrats for questionable behavior. Omar and several other Democrats openly accused Republicans of racism.
"I am Muslim, I am an immigration, and interestingly, from Africa," Omar said. "Is anyone surprised that I am being targeted? Is anyone surprised that I am somehow deemed unworthy to speak about American foreign policy, or that they see me as a powerful voice that needs to be silenced."
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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., dismissed GOP claims that they were being "consistent" with past practices by seeking Omar’s dismissal.
"Consistency? There is nothing consistent with the Republican Party’s continued attack, except for the racism and incitement of violence against women of color in this body," Ocasio-Cortez said. "This is about targeting women of color in the United States of America."
"Why is this member being targeted today?" asked Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y. "Could it be the way that she looks? Could it be the way her religious practices? Because it’s clear if she were on the other side of the aisle, we would not be having this debate today."
But Republicans said Omar’s past comments make her unsuitable to sit on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
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Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss., who chairs the House Ethics Committee, said Republicans are only following the "roadmap previously approved" by the Democrat-controlled 117th Congress, which Democrats used to remove a Republican member from all House committees.
Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., said she has seen Omar’s antisemitism and anti-Americanism firsthand.
"As a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I’ve sat there and heard the representative actually spew anti-American rhetoric as well," Malliotakis said of Omar. "I’ve been in that committee room where the representative equates Israel and the United States to Hamas and the Taliban. Absolutely unacceptable for a member of that committee."
The Republican justification for removing Omar from the committee was spelled out in the four-page resolution. It states that in 2019, Omar suggested that Jewish people were buying U.S. political support when she said, "It’s all about the Benjamins, baby," which struck many – including many Democrats – as an antisemitic trope.
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Omar also accused some Jewish Americans of having "allegiance to a foreign country," which again prompted backlash among Republicans and Democrats who said it was offensive and antisemitic to suggest supporting Israel is the same as having a foreign allegiance.
A month later, Omar described the 9/11 attacks in the U.S. that killed nearly 3,000 people as, "some people did something." Malliotakis said that line was especially egregious to lawmakers from New York, and is "unacceptable" for any member of the committee to say.
In 2021, Omar called Israel an "apartheid state," and lumped the U.S. and Israel in with Hamas and the Taliban as political entities that have committed "unthinkable atrocities."
The resolution says members of the Foreign Affairs Committee should be held to an "equal standard of conduct due to the international sensitivities and national security concerns under the jurisdiction of this committee."
"Representative Omar, by her own words, has disqualified herself from serving on the Committee on Foreign Affairs, a panel that is viewed by nations around the world as speaking for Congress on matters of international importance and national security," it said.
