Politics

Ilhan Omar Jumps On The Covington Kids Smear Bandwagon Three Days Late

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Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar continued to promulgate a debunked narrative on Tuesday by misrepresenting an incident between Catholic high school boys, black supremacists and American Indian activists.

Students from Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky were attending a school-sponsored trip to the March for Life on Friday when they were taunted by a group of self-described Black Hebrew Israelites, who were protesting and taking videos. After the Black Hebrew Israelites jeered a nearby group of Native Americans who were gathered for the Indigenous Peoples March, a confrontation ensued between the three groups.

A short video quickly went viral showing the boys laughing and chanting around the small group of Native American protesters. The boys, who were wearing Make America Great Again (MAGA) hats, were quickly dubbed the “MAGA hat kids” and the incident was characterized as a racially motivated attack.

Native American activist Nathan Phillips repeatedly misrepresented several facts about the viral incident, however, the news media largely ran with his story.

A longer video was released that corroborated the students’ accounts of events and debunked Phillips’ statements. Regardless, Omar continued to promote the false narrative three days after it was debunked.

Ilhan Omar Twitter/screen shot

-The boys were protesting a woman’s right to choose & yelled “it’s not rape if you enjoy it”
-They were taunting 5 Black men before they surrounded Phillips and led racist chants
-Sandmann’s family hired a right wing PR firm to write his non-apology https://t.co/fG8AUCuDTr https://t.co/bOA6yFsIjW

— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) January 23, 2019

Omar tweeted on Tuesday evening that the Covington students were “taunting 5 Black men before they surrounded Phillips and led racist chants.” The five black men the Minnesota congresswoman was referring to were members of Black Hebrew Israelites, an organization designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as a black supremacist group “on the extremist fringe.”

The full video shows that while the Black Hebrew Israelites criticized the students’ “racist” MAGA hats and referred to them with derogatory terms such as “crackers” and “incest children,” the students did not engage in the confrontation. Rather, they chanted the Covington Catholic spirit cheer to drown out the vulgar shouts.

Omar seemingly took umbrage with the students’ decision to participate in the March for Life by pointing out that the students were “protesting a woman’s right to choose,” and she accused them of yelling, “It’s not rape if you enjoy it,” a claim which has yet to be verified.

While Omar has been in office for less than a month, she has been surrounded by numerous controversies. The freshman congresswoman defended anti-Semitic statements, such as ones invoking Allah to expose Israel’s “evil doings” and she has come out in favor of the boycott and divestment from the state of Israel. She also claimed Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was “compromised” without providing any evidence.

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