A Republican congressman responded to Ilhan Omar’s grief over the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Friday by comparing it to the September 11 attacks.
A police officer was killed when a suspect hit him and another officer with his car on Friday. The suspect swung a knife and was shot dead. The other officer hit by the car survived.
The attack was not quite three months after supporters of Donald Trump attacked the Capitol on January 6 to stop the election. A police officer was one of five people killed as a result.
Omar was at the Capitol that day. In January, she told the Guardian she ‘did not know if I would make it out’ and called her ex-husband ‘to make sure he would keep telling my children that I loved them if I did not make it out. ”.
Security was increased and the attack on Friday provoked confusion and fear.
Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, tweeted: ‘Sad 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. The death toll would have been worse if the attacker had an AR-15 [assault rifle] instead of a knife. ‘
In response, North Carolina Congresswoman Greg Murphy wrote, “It would have been worse if they had also flown planes into the buildings.”
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 reprimanded.
“You just called September 11 to attack a Muslim member of Congress,” Jeff Jackson, a Democrat, wrote in the North Carolina senator. “I knew you a little when you were in the state legislature. This is good among you. No matter how strongly you disagree with her on the policy; you must represent our state better than that. ”
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 victims of Muslim and other minorities who hate crime targeted in the aftermath of 9/11. His outspoken remarks only serve to perpetuate the climate of hatred we see nationwide. ”
McCaw also said he hopes “Murphy’s Republican colleagues will condemn this Islamophobic attack and not just look at it differently from the time when Muslim members of Congress were similarly attacked in the past.”
The tweet was removed.
A TV station in Charlotte, WITN, reported that Murphy had tweeted and deleted before. In October, he now calls Vice President Kamala Harris “a walking disaster … just chosen for her color and her race … is that how we choose our leaders in America now?”
Murphy did not immediately comment.
On Saturday, however, one Twitter user responded to a congressional tweet about Covid and immigration tell Murphy he followed “Typically [Republican] MO. Never take the high road. Never give a solution to the problem. ALWAYS STUCK division. ”
“Awww,” replied Murphy, who was a doctor before entering Congress and working as a medical missionary. “Sorry I activated you …”