Omar’s antics could trouble Dems in 2020
The video gone viral of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar channeling Joseph McCarthy during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last Wednesday was an extremely bad look for Omar, the newly minted darling of the American left.
It also portends potential trouble for Democrats as they struggle to look outside of their bubble and prepare to challenge Donald Trump in 2020. Omar’s questioning of the Trump administration’s special envoy to Venezuela, Elliott Abrams, was a needlessly ad hominem attack on the longtime diplomat and foreign policy thinker, delivered with surly, smirking demagoguery. Intended to besmirch Abrams’ character, it instead raised questions about Omar’s.
Nearly 30 years ago, Abrams pleaded guilty to withholding information from Congress regarding the Iran-Contra affair in the 1980s, when he served the Reagan administration. Subsequently pardoned by President George H.W. Bush, Abrams went on to serve honorably during George W. Bush’s presidency as a national security adviser and was the architect of Bush’s effort to promote democracy. Out of government he has commanded respect in the foreign policy community and in academia. A vocal critic of Trump during the 2016 campaign, he was reportedly Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s choice to be deputy secretary of state, but was vetoed by Trump because of that criticism.
The sneering bullying of witnesses and the refusal to permit witnesses under personal attack to defend themselves was the hallmark of the McCarthy era, and ever since has been the touchstone of congressional behavior gone off the rails. In her treatment of Abrams, the supremely self-satisfied-seeming Congresswoman Omar appeared oblivious to how much she resembled the Wisconsin senator. In what was supposed to be an information-gathering hearing, Omar decided to begin her “questioning” by humiliating Abrams over his guilty plea three decades ago. “I fail to understand why members of this committee should find any testimony that you give today truthful,” she began with a sarcastic, mirthless smile, and when he tried to defend himself, asking, “If I could just respond to that,” she shut him down, snapping, “That was not a question.”
She then proceeded to twist his words about the political evolution of El Salvador, asking him if he believed that a massacre there was a “fabulous achievement,” and then twist them further in a fashion that would have made Roy Cohn, McCarthy’s chief counsel and later adviser to Trump, mighty proud. “That is a ridiculous question and I will not respond to it,” said Abrams. “Yes or no?” demanded Omar. “No,” replied Abrams. “I will take that as a yes,” said Omar.
This was days after Omar had been rebuked by the entire Democratic leadership for her most recent public display of anti-Semitism. “It’s all about the Benjamins, baby” — a reference to $100 bills — she had tweeted, expressly accusing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee of buying American support for Israel. To their credit, congressional Democratic leaders condemned Omar’s “use of antiSemitic tropes and prejudicial accusations about Israel’s supporters,” demanding she apologize. Omar reluctantly complied — sort of — and then assured her numerous supporters that she was not apologizing at all. After all, she has invoked the oldest, most vile anti-Semitic stereotypes before. “Israel has hypnotized the world. May Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel,” she tweeted in 2012.
The far left of the Democratic Party, which holds outsized influence over its presidential nominating process, applauds Omar’s conduct. These include many of the Bernie Sanders supporters and Jill Stein diehards who helped bring us Trump in the first place. The vast majority of Americans find it repellent. Therein lies the Democrats’ dilemma: Too much indulgence of the Omar wing of their party and they may find themselves with Act 2 of the Trump years in January 2021, wondering how it happened.