Rep. Ilhan Omar fires back after Trump suggests the United States isn't her country


During a rally in Pennsylvania on Tuesday, President Trump went after Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), echoing comments he made previously about her not being American.
In July 2019, Trump tweeted in reference to Omar and three other freshman women of color — Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), and Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) — saying they needed "to go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came." Only Omar was born outside of the U.S., in Somalia. As a child, her family left the country to escape civil war, and she became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2000.
Speaking to his supporters Tuesday night, Trump declared that he is going to win Minnesota in November because of Omar. "She's telling us how to run our country," he said. "How did you do where you came from? How is your country doing? They're going to tell, she's going to tell us, she's telling us how to run our country."
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Omar quickly fired back on Twitter, telling Trump: "Firstly, this is my country and I am a member of the House that impeached you. Secondly, I fled civil war when I was 8. An 8-year-old doesn't run a country even though you run our country like one." Catherine Garcia
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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