House Democrats to broaden anti-Semitism resolution, likely delaying vote
A resolution in the House condemning anti-Semitism will be updated to include anti-Muslim bias and other forms of bigotry, likely pushing a vote to Thursday, a day later than originally scheduled. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told Democratic leaders about the change of plans Tuesday evening, according to a Democratic aide.
The resolution had widely been seen as a rebuke of freshman Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, who has faced backlash for controversial comments about Israel, most recently for saying Israel's "political influence" leads people to "push for allegiance to a foreign country."
Without mentioning Omar by name, the four-page resolution says her comment "suggests that Jews cannot be patriotic Americans and trust neighbors." Omar did not answer questions about her comments while leaving her Capitol Hill office Tuesday.
"As someone who's Jewish, the idea that you question my loyalty to the country as a lawmaker because of my religion is obviously offensive and deeply hurtful," said Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey.
Pelosi shares the cover of this month's Rolling Stone with Omar, the nation's first Muslim congresswoman. But the Democratic leader also reprimanded Omar last month for a tweet about a Jewish lobbying group and money.
Omar said she's being held to a double standard. Last week, a poster in the West Virginia state capitol linked her to 9/11.
"We get to be called names and we get to be labeled as hateful. We know what hate looks like. We experience it every single day," she said.
Omar has received continued support from fellow freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has claimed that other kinds of bigotry are not as widely condemned.
"One of the things that is hurtful about the extent to which reprimand is sought of Ilhan is that no one seeks this level of reprimand when members make statements about Latinx + other communities," Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Twitter.
The decision to expand the resolution to include a denunciation of anti-Muslim bias indicates Omar and Ocasio-Cortez's complaints are not falling on deaf ears.
Rebecca Kaplan, Bo Erickson and Grace Segers contributed to this report.
