Ilhan Omar Facing Shockingly Well-Funded Primary Race- And She Plans to Win
Earlier this week progressive Congresswoman Ilhan Omar joined fellow progressive Minnesotan Keith Ellison and fellow Congresswomen Ayanna Pressley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Bonnie Watson Coleman for an act.tv virtual conversation closing out her August day of action. On August 11th the Congresswoman will face down four challengers to maintain her role representing the 5th district. You can support her by making a contribution at ilhanomar.com/give.
Attorney General Keith Ellison believes she can win: If Democrats ever walked away from this idea that it’s all about winning the election, and replaced it with the idea that it’s about building a relationship with the people who we represent (which takes place 365 days a year, on election year or off election year), then the elections wouldn’t be a problem!
“It’s easy to see “People in the center of politics” as the motto history could grant the freshman “squad” of Congresswomen.”
As Ellison, who recently lost his mother to Covid-19, goes into offering his condolences to Omar on the death of her own father (also to the novel coronavirus), he calls the deaths political: “a failure of public policy.” As America continues to be ravaged by the greatest global death toll under an administration which still seeks to minimize the pandemic’s seriousness, as political inaction allows the disease to simultaneously disable the economy while many fear for their lives, this feels like a tragically well supported assessment. Still, in what is perhaps the darkest political era in modern history, Congresswoman Omar is bold, clear, and positive: “we need to put PEOPLE in the center of politics. PEOPLE in the center of making decisions.”
It’s easy to see “People in the center of politics” as the motto history could grant the freshman “squad” of Congresswomen that Omar is so frequently accompanied by: Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Ayanna Pressley; all of whom have spent their first term in congress moving the legislative agenda toward the articulated concerns of middle and working class Americans. The young and brilliant group of women has received media attention outsized in proportion to their nascent political careers. If this speaks to the brilliance and leadership of the women in question, it also speaks to the popularity of their ideas and the widespread support for their progressive platforms. None among the four were elected with the objective to simply fall in line: they came to Washington with the explicit goal of making working people’s concerns heard and felt in the halls of Congress. And despite significant legislative hostaging in Mitch McConnell’s Senate, they have done just that.
“When people say we shouldn’t introduce aspirational legislation? We KNOW. We’re not even two years removed from living paycheck to paycheck,” Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez says in their conversation; highlighting the working class background that all four women have in common. “That urgency that we get criticized for in Washington, that [lack of etiquette] is because we KNOW that everybody [working class] is living on a month to month basis.” Congresswoman Pressley came in later with similarly strong thinking: We seek to offer responsive legislation. I always say policy is my love language, because we have seen hate, hurt and harm for generations, and so we need to be precise about how it has been codified through law making.
Ilhan Omar faces four challengers in her August primary; something in itself indicative of the anxiety established liberal donors have about the young up-and- coming generation of progressive legislators (though, it’s important to note that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi lent her endorsement to Omar in July). Ilhan specifically has seen an overwhelming amount of money thrown towards challengers likely directly related to her outspoken support for Palestinians; some statements she has later apologized for. The money donated to her challengers has itself raised questions, but if Omar is concerned about being out fundraised, she doesn’t show it. The Congresswoman is bright, intelligent, tenacious, and seems ready to get back to work on protecting Americans from the numerous governmental obstacles to their health and safety- like she always does.
