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House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy blasted Democrats for refusing to address highly controversial statements made by two of the party’s most explosive members while demanding he disciplines Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) following comments she made at a campaign event about Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.).
Earlier, Fox News noted:
Boebert was filmed telling supporters that she recently had a run-in with Omar in a Capitol building elevator. She said as she was getting in the elevator with a staffer when she saw a Capitol police officer running toward them “with fret all over his face” in an effort to stop the elevator door from closing.
“I look to my left and there she is: Ilhan Omar. And I said, ‘Well, she doesn’t have a backpack. We should be fine,’” Boebert said, sparking cheers. “I looked over and I said, ‘Oh look, the jihad squad decided to show up for work today.’
“Don’t worry, it’s just her staffers on Twitter that talk for her. She’s not tough in person,” she added.
Boebert went on to apologize for the remark.
“I apologize to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment about Rep. Omar,” she wrote. “I have reached out to her office to speak with her directly. There are plenty of policy differences to focus on without this unnecessary distraction.”
The Colorado freshman lawmaker also telephoned Omar last week to discuss the situation further but she said that the Minnesota Democrat eventually hung up on her.
“Now as a strong, Christian woman who values faith deeply, I never want anything I say to offend someone’s religion. So I told her that. Even after I put out a public statement to that effect, she said that she still wanted a public apology because what I had done wasn’t good enough,” Boebert said.
“She kept asking for a public apology so I told Ilhan Omar that she should make a public apology to the American people for her anti-American, anti-Semitic, anti-police rhetoric,” the Colorado Republican continued. “She continued to press and I continued to press back. And then, Representative Omar hung up on me.”
Following the phone call, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., blasted House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and accused him of leading a “KKK caucus.”
“People truly don’t understand the scale, intensity, & volume of threats targeting [Rep. Ilhan Omar],” AOC posted to Twitter. “Kevin McCarthy is so desperate to be speaker that he is working with his Ku Klux Klan caucus to look aside & allow violent targeting of woc (women of color) members of Congress.”
“This cannot be ignored,” she added.
On Friday, Democrats demanded the Colorado Republican be sanctioned for her ‘jihad’ remarks concerning the Minnesota Democrat. Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Joyce Beatty, Judy Chu, David Cicilline, and Raul Ruiz led the call for Boebert to face ‘consequences’ for her anti-Muslim rhetoric.
“Today, we are calling for Representative Boebert to be removed from her committee assignments,” their letter read. “We stand with Representative Omar and millions of Muslims across the country who deserve better and are looking to their elected leadership to condemn islamophobia at the highest levels of government.”
That led McCarthy to blast Democrats for their apparent hypocrisy.
“Let me be very clear. This party is for anyone and everyone who craves freedom and supports religious liberty,” McCarthy said at a Capitol Hill press conference on Friday. “Lauren Boebert, as I called her, when it came forward we talked, she apologized publicly, she apologized personally.
“Did any of you raise the question when someone on their side of the aisle said I worked with the Ku Klux Klan, referring to Republicans?” he asked.
“Did anyone on your side of the aisle talk about when Omar said the only reason I support Israel is all about the Benjamins?”: McCarthy continued, mentioning an earlier controversy that involved the Minnesota Democrat’s disparaging of Israel.
