Ilhan Omar

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      Congress considers awarding Prince with congressional gold medal

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      PrinceCongress considers awarding Prince with congressional gold medalIlhan Omar, a co-sponsor of the resolution to honor the musician who died in 2016, said he ‘changed the arc of music history’ Maya Yang and agenciesMon 25 Oct 2021 13.54 EDTLast modified on Mon 25 Oct 2021 14.01 EDTA resolution introduced on Capitol Hill on Monday seeks to award the congressional gold medal to Prince, in recognition of the late pop star’s “indelible mark on Minnesota and American culture”.Past recipients of the highest civilian honor bestowed by Congress include George Washington, the Wright Brothers, Rosa Parks, Mother Teresa and the Dalai Lama.Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, a refugee from Somalia, one of the first Muslim women to enter Congress and a co-sponsor of the resolution to honor Prince, said he showed her “it was OK to be a short, Black kid from Minneapolis and still change the world”.Born Prince Rogers Nelson, in the 1970s Prince pioneered the Minneapolis sound, a subgenre of funk rock that incorporates elements of synth-pop and new wave.In a prolific career that spanned nearly four decades and made his flamboyant and androgynous persona world famous, Prince released 39 studio albums and sold more than 150m records, making him among the bestselling musicians of all time. His hits include Purple Rain, Kiss, When Doves Cry and Let’s Go Crazy, all of which made Billboard’s Hot 100 charts.Prince died on 21 April 2016 at the age of 57 of an accidental fentanyl overdose at his Paisley Park estate in Chanhassen, Minnesota.Introducing the resolution to honor him, the Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar, a former candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, said: “The world is a whole lot cooler because Prince was in it – he touched our hearts, opened our minds, and made us want to dance.“With this legislation, we honor his memory and contributions as a composer, performer, and music innovator. Purple reigns in Minnesota today and every day because of him.”The resolution noted that Prince was “widely regarded as one of the greatest musicians of his generation”, having won seven Grammy awards, six American Music Awards, an Oscar for the score to the movie Purple Rain and a Golden Globe.“I remember when I first came to America being captivated by Prince’s music and impact on the culture,” said Omar. “He not only changed the arc of music history; he put Minneapolis on the map.”Under congressional rules, the resolution will require the support of at least two-thirds of the Senate and the House before it can be signed into law by Joe Biden.If the medal is approved, the bill asks that it be given to the Smithsonian Institution and be made available for display, especially at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.In July, a Prince album recorded in 2010, Welcome 2 America, was posthumously released through NPG Records.TopicsPrinceUS politicsIlhan OmarAmy KlobucharnewsReuse this content More

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      Nancy Pelosi rebukes Ilhan Omar for tweet on Israel, Hamas and Taliban

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      The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, issued a rebuke of Ilhan Omar on Thursday, after the outspoken Minnesota congresswoman said she was a victim of “harassment and silencing” by fellow Democrats over a remark about the US, Israel, Afghanistan and Hamas.“Drawing false equivalencies between democracies like the US and Israel and groups that engage in terrorism like Hamas and the Taliban foments prejudice and undermines progress toward a future of peace and security for all,” Pelosi said, in a statement issued with the House majority leader, Steny Hoyer, and other members of the party hierarchy.Omar made the initial comments on Monday, in a tweet accompanying video of a question she asked the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, in a House hearing.“We must have the same level of accountability and justice for all victims of crimes against humanity,” Omar wrote. “We have seen unthinkable atrocities committed by the US, Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan and the Taliban. I asked Secretary Blinken where people are supposed to go for justice.”The tweet stoked controversy for seeming to equate the actions of the US and Israel with those of Hamas, an Iran-linked militant organisation in the Palestinian territories which the US lists as a terrorist group, and the Taliban, Islamic extremists US and coalition troops have fought in Afghanistan for nearly 20 years.In May, conflict between Israel and Hamas led to the deaths of 12 people in Israel and 248 in the Palestinian territories – and accusations of war crimes on both sides.As Republicans accused Omar of antisemitism and pushed for her to be expelled from the House foreign affairs committee, a group of Jewish House Democrats issued their own criticism.“Equating the United States and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban is as offensive as it is misguided,” they wrote in a statement. “Ignoring the differences between democracies governed by the rule of law and contemptible organisations that engage in terrorism at best discredits one’s intended argument and at worst reflects deep-seated prejudice.“The United States and Israel are imperfect and, like all democracies, at times deserving of critique, but false equivalencies give cover to terrorist groups. We urge Congresswoman Omar to clarify her words.”On Twitter, Omar responded: “It’s shameful for colleagues who call me when they need my support to now put out a statement asking for ‘clarification’ and not just call. The Islamophobic tropes in this statement are offensive. The constant harassment and silencing from the signers of this letter is unbearable.“Citing an open case against Israel, US, Hamas & Taliban in the [International Criminal Court] isn’t comparison or from ‘deeply seated prejudice’. You might try to undermine these investigations or deny justice to their victims but history has thought us that the truth can’t be hidden or silenced forever.”She also retweeted comments by the MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan, who said: “Maybe these House Democrats should read beyond the Fox/Daily Mail headlines and faux outrage and not help incite more hate against Omar.”Omar reported receiving threats, including being called “a raghead N-word” and her staff “anti-American communist piece[s] of shit”.“This is the kind of incitement and hate that leads to real violence,” she said.Omar came to the US from Somalia as child and in 2018 was one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress. With the other, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, she is a member of the so-called “Squad” of Democratic women of colour whose progressive values and use of the media spotlight often put them at odds with party leaders.Among Democrats who came to Omar’s defence amid controversy over her remark about Hamas and the Taliban, the Missouri representative Cori Bush said: “I’m not surprised when Republicans attack Black women for standing up for human rights. But when it’s Democrats, it’s especially hurtful. We’re your colleagues. Talk to us directly. Enough with the anti-Blackness and Islamophobia.”On Thursday Omar did clarify her remarks, saying she was not making “a moral comparison between Hamas and the Taliban and the US and Israel” and was “in no way equating terrorist organisations with democratic countries”.Pelosi and Hoyer said: “We welcome the clarification by Congresswoman Omar that there is no moral equivalency between the US and Israel and Hamas and the Taliban.” More

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      ‘Enough of the senseless killings’: Biden calls Chauvin verdict ‘a start’ as Democrats demand action

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      Addressing the nation on Tuesday evening, Joe Biden said the guilty verdict for the former Minneapolis police office Derek Chauvin was “a start”. But, he said, “in order to deliver real change and reform, we can and we must do more”.“Protests unified people of every race and generation in peace and with purpose to say enough,” Biden said. “Enough. Enough of the senseless killings. Today’s verdict is a step forward.“The guilty verdict does not bring back George,” he continued, noting that he had called the Floyd family after the news had come. “George’s legacy will not be just about his death, but about what we must do in his memory.”Many lawmakers and public figures celebrated the verdict while also calling for more to be done, echoing years-long demands by Black Lives Matter activists for systemic change.Cori Bush, the Black Lives Matter activist who was elected last year to represent Missouri in the US House of Representatives, said the verdict “is accountability, but it’s not yet justice.”Kamala Harris, who spoke before Biden, said the administration would work to help pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, a bill that Harris – as a senator – introduced last summer along with Senator Cory Booker and Representative Karen Bass. “This bill is part of George Floyd’s legacy,” she said. “The president and I will continue to urge the Senate to pass this legislation, not as a panacea for every problem, but as a start. This work is long overdue.”Democratic lawmakers echoed Harris, while Republicans, who have obstructed the bill’s passage for nearly a year, remained largely silent.[embedded content]Bass, a Democrat of California, said she hoped the verdict today would re-energize efforts to pass the police reform bill into law. The bill passed the House this year with no Republican support – and it faces a major hurdle in the Senate, where Republicans are expected to block it with a filibuster.“We need to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, and put it on President Biden’s desk,” she said, speaking with members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) on Capitol Hill. “Because that will be the first step to transforming policing.”In any case, she later told reporters, the Chauvin verdict “gives us hope” for some sort of policing bill. Bass has been in informal talks with Republican lawmakers to develop a bipartisan compromise and hopes a deal can be reached “by the time we hit the anniversary of George Floyd’s death” on 25 May, she told reporters.The rare guilty verdict came as a shock and a relief to many lawmakers and public figures. Following its announcement Bass hugged Gwen Moore, a Democratic representative of Wisconsin and fellow member of the CBC. “I was knocked off my feet,” Moore told Bass, as they embraced.Ilhan Omar, the US representative for Minneapolis, said the verdict represents a type of justice that feels “new and long overdue,” adding: “Alhamdulillah!”Remarks by the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, however, raised some eyebrows. In an address from Capitol Hill, she said: “Thank you, George Floyd, for sacrificing your life for justice. For being there to call out to your mom, how heartbreaking was that, call out for your mom, ‘I can’t breathe,’” she said.As many listeners and watchers pointed out, Floyd didn’t choose to sacrifice himself or to be a martyr – he was killed.“I know someone wrote this for her. Someone else edited the draft. Most likely yet another person approved it. And then she said it,” said the writer Mikki Kendall. “This is a long trail of fail.”Barack Obama praised the efforts of Black Lives Matter activists and people around the world protested in the aftermath of Floyd’s killing.“As we continue the fight, we can draw strength from the millions of people – especially young people – who have marched and protested and spoken up over the last year, shining a light on inequity and calling for change,” Barack and Michelle Obama said in a joint statement. “Justice is closer today not simply because of this verdict, but because of their work.”In a call to Floyd’s family, Biden reiterated his promise to enact meaningful change. “We’re going to stay at it until we get it done,” he said. More

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      Republican congressman condemned over Islamophobic tweet to Ilhan Omar

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      A Republican congressman responded to Ilhan Omar’s expression of grief about the attack at the US Capitol on Friday by comparing it to the 9/11 attacks.A police officer was killed when a suspect rammed him and another officer with his car outside the Capitol on Friday. The suspect wielded a knife and was shot dead. The other officer hit by the car survived.The attack came not quite three months after supporters of Donald Trump attacked the Capitol on 6 January, seeking to overturn the election. A police officer was one of five people who died as a direct result.Omar was at the Capitol that day. In January, she told the Guardian she “didn’t know if I would make it out” and had called her ex-husband “to make sure he would continue to tell my children that I loved them if I didn’t make it out”.Security has been heightened and the attack on Friday provoked confusion and fear.Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, tweeted: “Heartbroken to learn another [police officer] was killed while protecting the Capitol. My thoughts and prayers go out to the officer’s family and the entire Capitol police force. The death toll would have been worse if the assailant had an AR-15 [assault rifle] instead of a knife.”In response, Congressman Greg Murphy of North Carolina wrote: “Would have been worse if they had been flying planes into the buildings also.”Omar, who came to the US from Somalia as a child, is one of the first two Muslim women to be elected to Congress.Murphy was widely rebuked.“You just invoked Sept 11 to attack a Muslim member of Congress,” wrote the North Carolina state senator Jeff Jackson, a Democrat. “I knew you a little when you were in the state legislature. This is well beneath you. It doesn’t matter how strongly you disagree with her on policy, you should represent our state better than this.”Robert S McCaw, director of government affairs for the Council on Islamic Relations (Cair), said Murphy’s tweet was “disrespectful to the victims of the 9/11 attacks, to their families and to the countless Muslim and other minority hate crime victims who were targeted in the wake of 9/11. His bigoted comments only serve to perpetuate the climate of hate that we are witnessing nationwide.”McCaw also said he hoped “Murphy’s Republican colleagues will condemn this Islamophobic attack and not just look the other way as they did when Muslim members of Congress were attacked similarly in the past.”The tweet was deleted.A Charlotte TV station, WITN, reported that Murphy has tweeted and deleted before. In October, he called now vice-president Kamala Harris “a walking disaster … only picked for her color and her race … is that how we pick our leaders now in America?”Murphy did not immediately comment.On Saturday, however, one Twitter user responding to a tweet by the congressman about Covid and immigration told Murphy he followed “Typical [Republican] MO. Never take the high road. Never provide a solution to the issue. ALWAYS stoke division.”“Awww,” replied Murphy, who was a doctor before entering Congress and worked as a medical missionary. “Sorry I triggered you …” More

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      Ilhan Omar at odds with Stacey Abrams over Georgia All-Star Game boycott

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      The Minnesota representative Ilhan Omar has backed Major League Baseball’s decision to move its All-Star Game from Georgia over a restrictive new voting law. But in doing so she placed herself at odds with another leading progressive, the voting rights campaigner Stacey Abrams.Abrams, who suffered a narrow defeat in the Georgia gubernatorial race in 2018, commended the MLB’s decision on Friday but said she was disappointed the game was being relocated.“I respect boycotts,” she said, “although I don’t want to see Georgia families hurt by lost events and jobs. Georgians targeted by voter suppression will be hurt as opportunities go to other states. We should not abandon the victims of [Republican] malice and lies – we must stand together.”On Saturday the PGA Tour and the PGA of America made similar arguments when they said they would not move events scheduled for Georgia this summer. The Masters, perhaps the biggest event in golf, begins in Augusta, Georgia this week.Many observers question the accepted wisdom that big sporting events bring economic benefits but on Sunday, on CNN’s State of the Union, Omar was asked if she agreed with Abrams.“We know that boycotts have allowed for justice to be delivered in many spaces,” Omar said. “The civil rights movement was rooted in boycotts. We know that apartheid ended in South Africa because of boycotts.“And so our hope is that this boycott will result in changes in the law because we understand that when you restrict people’s ability to vote, you create a democracy that isn’t fully functioning for all of us, and if we are to continue to be beacon of hope for all democracies around the world we must stand our ground.”Conservatives have protested the MLB decision to take the All-Star Game away from Georgia. On Friday, Trump told supporters they should “boycott baseball” in return.Among other measures, the Georgia law applies restrictions to early and mail-in voting, measures likely to affect minority participation.Republicans have countered Democratic protests by saying the law merely seeks to avoid electoral fraud, which Donald Trump claimed was rampant in his defeat by Joe Biden in Georgia and elsewhere – a lie repeatedly laughed out of court.Omar was asked if other states which do not even allow early or mail-in voting should examine their own laws.“They certainly should,” she said. “I mean, Minnesota is not No1 in voter turnout and participation because we are special, even though we are. It’s because we have made voting accessible for people. And it is really important that every single state, we examine their voting laws and make sure that voting is accessible to everyone.”Omar also referred to pending federal legislation which seeks to counter moves by Republican-led states. The For the People Act, technically known as HR1, has passed the House but seems unlikely to pass the 50-50 Senate unless Democrats reform or abolish the filibuster, under which bills must attract 60 votes to pass.“It’s also going to be really important for us to continue to push HR1,” Omar said, “which makes [voting] accessible nationwide and strengthens our democracy.” More

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      Omar urges end to prison contracts to fix 'abuse-ridden' immigration detention system

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      Ilhan Omar has called on the Biden administration to phase out immigration detention contracts between Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) and local jails and prisons.In a letter to Susan Rice, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, and Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Minnesota Democrat said the contracts perpetuated mass incarceration.“In order to truly sever the financial incentives causing the expansion of an unnecessary and abuse-ridden system of mass incarceration, we urge you to end contracts between the federal government and localities for the purposes of immigration detention,” Omar wrote, in a letter also signed by other Democratic members of Congress.Immigration activists have for years targeted such contracts at local levels.In New Jersey, lawmakers are considering proposals that would prevent counties, municipalities and private prison operators from entering into such contracts or renewing or extending those already in effect. In California in 2019 the governor, Gavin Newsom, signed a law blocking the state from entering into or renewing contracts with private prison companies.Biden is under pressure to address the sprawling US immigration detention system, the largest in the world and rampant with allegations of abuse.More than 70 members of Congress, including Omar, have called on Biden to phase out the use of private prisons for immigration detention. Biden signed an executive order to do so at justice department facilities, but not at facilities which detain migrants.Biden’s administration is also attempting to respond to an increase in asylum-seeking children at the southern border. A near-record 9,457 unaccompanied children were taken into US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) custody in February, according to the agency, the most since May 2019.In recent weeks, thousands of children have stayed in CBP facilities beyond the 72-hour legal limit, after which they are supposed to be moved to the care of the US health department.A CBP tent facility in Donna, some 165 miles south of Dallas, is holding more than 1,000 children and teenagers, some as young as four. Lawyers who inspect immigrant detention facilities have said they have interviewed children who reported being held in packed conditions, some sleeping on the floor, others not able to shower for five days.Biden is using the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), best known for responding to natural disasters, to manage and care for the children.Later on Monday, it was reported that the administration plans to use a downtown Dallas convention center to hold up to 3,000 immigrant teenagers.The Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center will be used for up to 90 days beginning as early as this week, according to written notification sent to members of the Dallas city council on Monday and obtained by the Associated Press. Federal agencies will use the facility to house boys ages 15 to 17, according to the memo, which described the soon-to-open site as a “decompression center”. More

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      'I didn’t know if I would make it out that day': Ilhan Omar on the terror of the Capitol attack

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      Representative Ilhan Omar began to fear for her life as soon as the evacuation began.She had watched from a balcony as a mob of insurrectionists invaded the US Capitol on 6 January, incited by the president of the United States. As she was escorted to a secure area, she made a phone call to her ex-husband, the father of her children.“I didn’t know if I would make it out that day and [I] just … made a request to him to make sure he would continue to tell my children that I loved them if I didn’t make it out.”They didn’t succeed in stopping the functions of democracy, but I do believe they succeeded in ending the openness of our democracy.Omar, the Democratic congresswoman from Minnesota’s fifth district, a famed member of the progressive movement, and the first Somali American elected to Congress, has long endured threats and racist abuse from Donald Trump and his supporters. But it’s clear, during an interview with the Guardian on Zoom, that the events of 6 January have left a lasting and unique trauma.She takes long pauses as she recalls the details.“It was a very traumatizing experience, and all of us will be traumatized by it for a really long time,” she says. “The face of the Capitol will forever be changed. They didn’t succeed in stopping the functions of democracy, but I do believe they succeeded in ending the openness of our democracy.”Omar says she was evacuated to a secure location usually reserved only for senior congressional leaders. She says law enforcement believed “my life was at risk in the same way that congressional leadership’s life was at-risk” – citing a significant uptick in death threats in the two months before the presidential election, but adding: “For the better half of the last two years, the president has singled me out and has incited direct death threats against my life.”The 38-year-old who was first elected in 2018, was placed in the same room as the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and the Republican Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, along with other senior figures from both parties.“Leaders from both sides seemed to be terrorised by what was taking place,” she says. “I don’t think any of them ever expected to be witnessing an insurrection against our government. And I think that watching the response from the president was completely unsettling for them as well … I think the fear of what we were dealing with grew and you could see that in the faces of all of them.”The day after the mob violence, Omar was among the first House Democrats to draft articles of impeachment, which were eventually voted through (with only 10 Republicans siding), marking a historic second impeachment of the former president. She is now urging the Senate to begin trial proceedings as top Republicans look to stall the process into next month.Although Omar is talking through Zoom but it’s clear she is distinctly uneasy as she remembers the events of 6 January, a marked contrast to her affable demeanor on the occasions we have spoken in the past. Is she still in a state of shock?“I don’t know if I would use the word shock,” she says. “I would say it all feels exhausting.”She levels this exhaustion not just at Trump but at the many Republicans who have essentially continued to support the former president by voting against impeachment or to challenge the 2020 election result.“There’s a set of expectations in functioning as a part of a long-existing democracy, and to have allowed a president to degrade our traditions and norms, make a mockery of our laws, our constitution and oaths of office. And then to still deal with people who are ‘two-siding’ every conversation, who don’t have an ability to understand the gravity of what we are dealing with … is pretty exhausting.”Omar attended Joe Biden’s inauguration on Wednesday in a city under partial military lockdown following the insurrection. Like other colleagues in the progressive caucus of the party, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, she had endorsed Bernie Sanders in the Democratic presidential primary and did not always pull her punches when criticizing Biden’s primary run.Nonetheless, she expresses resolute optimism about the next four years and beams when discussing Biden’s first 48 hours in office, in which he has rescinded the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline and rejoined the Paris Climate Agreement.“There are things we’ve all been fighting for the last couple of years and to see a lot of that get done in the first day makes us all feel very optimistic and excited about what’s to come,” she says. “You know there will be plenty of time for us to disagree and fight some of our policy differences, but at the moment, as a progressive and as Whip of the progressive caucus, most of us are pretty pleased.”Still, she drifts back to reflections on the events of 6 January and worries about what she believes is potentially irreparable damage to the democratic process.“It dawned on me that my reality and the reality of many of the people who have served with both in the Minnesota House and in Congress is forever going to be shaped by these events,” she says. “In a free democracy, where we thrive on vigorous debate and discussion, without resorting to violence, [that] was no longer going to be part of our reality and that is truly shocking and disturbing and unsettling.” More

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      Insurrection and inauguration: Joe Biden's new political era – video

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      Following the US Capitol riot, Oliver Laughland and Tom Silverstone travel to Washington DC for the week of Joe Biden’s inauguration to find a downtown area under what is essentially military occupation and a city coming to terms with the trauma of Donald Trump’s final days in office. 
      They speak to lifelong residents in the outer suburbs as well the US congresswoman Ilhan Omar, who tells of her harrowing experience of the 6 January riot. Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton rails against criticisms of the Republican administration’s handling of the domestic terrorism threat
      ‘I didn’t know if I would make it out that day’: Ilhan Omar on the terror of the Capitol attack More