House condemns Trump remarks, tweets as racist
WASHINGTON — The Democrat-controlled U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a resolution condemning President Donald Trump for racist comments directed at four non-white female members of Congress.
The chamber voted 240187 largely along party lines to pass the resolution, which was introduced after Trump made the remarks in tweets and comments this week. The majority included four members of Trump’s Republican Party.
Trump caused a furor over the weekend when he said the members of Congress should “go back” to the countries “from which they came.” He then defended his remarks in further tweets and comments on Monday and Tuesday.
Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic speaker of the House of Representatives, said it was “stunning” to hear Trump’s words directed at colleagues.
“These comments from the White House are disgraceful and disgusting and these comments are racist,” she said on the House floor, adding that it was “shameful” to hear him defend his comments.
She said telling minorities to “go back” to where they came from has been used against people in the past to make them feel they didn’t belong because they weren’t born in the US or didn’t look like other people.
Trump insisted that his tweets were not racist, adding in a tweet on Tuesday that “I don’t have a Racist bone in my body!”
He said he believes the four woman who were the target of his attack hate the United States based on their comments and actions. Without referring to the women by name, he accused them of being anti-Semitic — charges they all flatly deny.
Before the vote the Republican leadership in Congress expressed its continued support for Trump. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to offer any criticism of the president’s remarks when pressed by reporters on Capitol Hill.
He accused the freshmen of making the “most vile accusations and insults against our nation” and said “it’s about time we lowered the temperature all across the board.” McConnell also insisted “the president is not a racist.”
Much of the recent criticism of the young lawmakers has come from their outspoken condemnation of Trump’s immigration policies and conditions at detention facilities at the border.
The four Democrats, known as “the squad,” held a briefing Monday to denounce Trump.
“He’s launching a blatantly racist attack on four duly elected members of the United States House of Representatives, all of whom are women of color,” said Representative Ilhan Omar.
Representative Ayanna Pressley described Trump’s tweets as a “distraction from the issues of consequence” and urged Americans “not take the bait.”
She said the “squad” is “more than four people” and despite attempts to silence them, she and the other three freshmen are “committed to building a more equitable and just world and that is the work that we want to get back to.”
The four women said Trump’s rhetoric and policies are part of the agenda of white nationalists, and Omar added her voice to those calling for Trump to be impeached.
Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib are the other two members of the group.
Omar was born in Somalia, while Tlaib was born in the US to Palestinian parents, and Ocasio-Cortez in New York to parents with roots in Puerto Rico — a US territory.
Omar and Tlaib became the first two Muslim women elected to Congress in 2018. Pressley is the first black woman elected to Congress in the state of Massachusetts and was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, to American parents.