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Measure condemning hate passed
In shift from Monday, House resolution condemns anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim bias equally.
WASHINGTON — The House on Thursday passed a measure broadly condemning hate, as Democrats seek to move past a controversy over alleged anti-Semitic comments from freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar.
The resolution condemns anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim bias in equal measure, a shift from a draft circulated Monday that rebuked only antiSemitism. Neither mentions Omar, D-Minn., or her comments specifically.
“It’s not about her,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said of Omar at a news conference. “It’s about these forms of hatred.”
Thursday’s vote reflected Democratic leaders’ concerns that the acrimonious issue is overshadowing their legislative agenda, including the expected passage Friday of a sweeping election and ethics reform bill.
But even the new resolution had problems. The vote was briefly delayed Thursday afternoon as House leaders made further changes to the resolution, broadening it again to acknowledge prejudice against more minority groups.
Omar suggested last week that Israel’s supporters have an “allegiance to a foreign country,” remarks that angered some Democrats who saw them as hateful tropes and who pushed to condemn the freshman lawmaker. Her defenders argued that leadership was applying a double standard in singling out one of the two Muslim women in Congress.
The resolution posted Thursday indirectly repudiates Omar’s comments, saying that “accusations of dual loyalty generally have an insidious and pernicious history” and noting that such an accusation “constitutes anti-Semitism because it suggests that Jewish citizens cannot be patriotic Americans and trusted neighbors.”
But it also includes language condemning antiMuslim bigotry “as hateful expressions of intolerance that are contrary to the values and aspirations of the United States,” and condemns incidents of mosque bombings and planned domestic terrorist attacks targeting Muslim communities.
Omar, a Somali American immigrant, has spoken about religiously motivated verbal attacks and threats she has been subjected to.
The decision to sanction Omar for her “allegiance” comments without mentioning the hatred she had faced — as well as incidents of intolerance concerning President Donald Trump and other Republicans — angered many Democrats and prompted a backlash at the initial plans to condemn anti-Semitism specifically.
That forced Democratic leaders to chart a delicate path to navigate the sensitivities of their own caucus.
The announcement that the House would move forward with a resolution came from House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, DMd., in a closed-door meeting.
“I do not believe that (Omar) understood the full weight of the words,” Pelosi said. “I feel confident that her words were not based on any anti-Semitic attitude.”
The seven-page resolution that passed the House acknowledges at one part that white supremacists have targeted “traditionally persecuted peoples, including African-Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders and other people of color, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, the LGBTQ community, immigrants, and others.”
Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, criticized the way Democrats handled the resolution. In remarks on the House floor, he asked why Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses or people with disabilities were not included, as well as lawmakers such as himself who are not members of marginalized groups but who have nonetheless received death threats.
“How long does it take to figure out, just don’t hate?” Collins asked. “Evil is evil.”
Numerous other Democrats expressed hope earlier Thursday that the new resolution could help Democrats put the Omar controversy behind them.
Noting the front-page coverage the controversy has received, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., said, “We want to put this thing to bed before we do H.R. 1, which is a really important bill.” She referred to the ethics and election reform bill.
She lashed out at reporters for covering the controversy surrounding Omar rather than the legislation: “I just think that it is shameful that it is being exploited, not just by the Republicans, but also by the press.”