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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsRep. Ilhan Omar tells California audience that Trump's anti-Islam remarks inspire attacks like NZ
Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, one of the first two Muslim women in Congress, accused President Trump on Saturday of inciting hatred of Islam and inspiring attacks like the killing of 50 people last weekend in a mass shooting at mosques in New Zealand.
In a speech to a packed hotel ballroom at a Muslim civil-rights banquet in Woodland Hills, the newly elected Democratic congresswoman said the New Zealand attack by a white supremacist fit a pattern of threats and assaults at American mosques and schools.
We all kind of knew that this was happening, she said. But the reason I think that many of us knew that this was going to get worse is that we finally had a leader in the White House who publicly says Islam hates us, who fuels hate against Muslims, who thinks it is OK to speak about a faith and a whole community in a way that is dehumanizing, vilifying.
Trump, she told the crowd, doesnt understand, or at least makes us want to think that he doesnt understand, the consequence that his words might have. Some people like me know that he understands the consequences. He knows that there are people that he can influence to threaten our lives, to diminish our presence.
https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-ilhan-omar-talks-valley-event-20190322-story.html
There was also a protest of her that she addressed in her remarks, she said There are thoroughly fascinating people outside who for so many years have spoken about an Islam that is oppressive, an Islam that lessens and isolates its women, and today they gather outside to protest a Muslim woman who is in Congress, she said. The irony in that is very entertaining to me."
Very entertaining indeed.