Rand Paul says he would help pay for ticket to send Omar to Somalia

Republican Senator Rand Paul has made  remarks with racist overtones against Muslim Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), saying he is ready to help purchase plane tickets for her to visit Somalia that might make her “appreciate America more.”

In an interview with the right-wing website Breitbart, Senator Paul called Omar “about as ungrateful as you can get.”

 “And so — I’m willing to contribute to buy her a ticket to go visit Somalia, and I think she can look and maybe learn a little bit about the disaster that is Somalia — that has no capitalism, has no God-given rights guaranteed in a constitution, and has about seven different tribes that have been fighting each other for the last 40 years,” the senator said.

“And then maybe after she’s visited Somalia for a while, she might come back and appreciate America more,” he added.

Republican President Donald Trump triggered a firestorm this month after he had tweeted that the four progressive members of the US House of Representatives, known as “the squad,” should “go back” where they came from, even though all are US citizens and three are US-born.

Omar, one of the four, was born in Somalia and immigrated to the US as a refugee in 1995 when she was a child. She became a US citizen in 2000 at age 17.

The other three members are Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts.

'Nativist, not racist' 

When Press TV asked American journalist and political analyst Don DeBar whether Senator Paul made the racist remarks, he said, “It's a stretch. I think the term ‘nativist’ would be accurate.”

“The argument being made is that she was not born here, but chose to come here after being born in Somalia and that, if she finds this place offensive, as they claim she does, she should spend some time in her native Somalia for a comparative view. That's nativism,” he explained.

The journalist said, “In my view, the entire exchange is a shitshow. The so-called Gang of Four is being portrayed as a new front of a rising progressivism waiting to take control of the Democratic Party and ultimately the political scene in the US. In fact, these four are as wedded to imperialism as anyone in Congress (their pronouncements on Zionism notwithstanding).”

“Policy-wise, they generally oppose Trump and support Obama, which is particularly ironic in the case of Omar, given that there are few actual progressives in Africa (including Somalia) who are grateful for Obama's insertion of Africom into the control of the continent's military forces,” he noted.

Press TV’s website can also be accessed at the following alternate addresses:

www.presstv.co.uk