Alabama Republican Rep. Jerry Carl told Just the News on Monday that he supports an upcoming resolution to remove Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar from her committee assignments after a recent statement in which she appeared to equate the U.S. and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban.
Carl said House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy is expected to introduce the resolution this week.
Omar wrote on Twitter last week about “unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban.”
She later attempted to clarify her statement saying she was “in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries.” Omar has received backlash in the past about some of her remarks related to Israel.
Carl said Omar’s latest statement was not a gaffe.
“If she said it once, that would be a gaffe. I mean, we all make those as elected officials and hang on every word, but she’s taken a stab at the America as a country several times. She doesn’t like America, she doesn’t like Christianity,” he said during “Just the News AM” on Monday.
“Kevin McCarthy will bring it up this week,” he also said. “We’ll see if we can push it for a vote and see if we can get her voted off her committee. She has no business on that committee if she’s going to be that radical. She needs to be protesting somewhere, not in Washington, D.C.”
Omar is a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Education and Labor Committee.
“The Democrat Party is protecting her. My question is, the Jewish members and Democrat Party, how are they going to respond if we can get it on the floor for a vote? I think it would be very hard to support her, very hard. I couldn’t imagine why they would want to knowing that she has, you know, spoken such atrocities to their entire culture,” Carl said.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was asked on Friday whether she thinks further action is needed against Omar as a result of her controversial statement.
“I don’t,” she replied.
Pelosi said she’s not concerned about the divide her statement might cause within the Democratic Party.
“I think that she clarified her remarks … and we accepted that. And she has a point that she wants to make and she has a right to make that point,” she said. “There was some unease about how it was interpreted. She made her clarification.”
Carl revealed that he will support McCarthy’s resolution when it is formally introduced.
“I would love to; I would jump on that in a heartbeat. I couldn’t imagine anyone not whether you’re Republican or Democrat, I mean, she sealed her own fate when she spoke it, not once, but several times,” he said.
Carl pointed out that it will take more than McCarthy and the Republicans to remove Omar from her committee assignments.
“But there are people within the Democrat Party that can encourage and force her to do it. Pelosi is doing what Pelosi has always done. She’ll cover for her own. She’s done a very good job of it and on the other hand, when a Republican gets out of line, it’s just pure attack attack attack,” he said. “So we’ve got to hold her feet to the fire on this one. I think we have every right to, I think, as a Christian nation; I think as a Jewish nation.”
