Rep. Ilhan Omar called out Tucker Carlson as a “racist fool” on Monday after the Fox News primetime host called Somali-born Democratic congresswoman “a living fire alarm, a warning to the rest of us” that immigration practices in America have become “dangerous.”
Omar responded to Carlson’t on-air attack on Twitter, saying, “Not gonna lie, it’s kinda fun watching a racist fool like this weeping about my presence in Congress.”
On his Monday broadcast, Carlson broadly accused Democrats of telling “lies” about America being “an awful country,” but zeroed in on the Minnesota Democrat herself, highlighting Omar’s own immigration to the U.S. as a child when her family fled a civil war in Somalia.
“Ilhan Omar has an awful lot to be grateful for,” he said, “but she isn’t grateful. Not at all. After everything America has done for Omar and for her family, she hates this country more than ever.”
He added, “Omar isn’t disappointed in America. She’s enraged by it. That should worry you, and not just because Omar is a sitting member of Congress. Ilhan Omar is living proof that the way we practice immigration has become dangerous to this country.”
Carlson, who lost a significant chunk of advertisers earlier this year after liberal group Media Matters for America unearthed old recordings in which he made disparaging comments about women and minorities, went on to question how and why the situation has, in his view, declined.
“Maybe that is our fault for asking too little of our immigrants. We aren’t self-confident enough to make them assimilate so they never feel fully American,” he suggested. “Or maybe the problem is deeper than that. Maybe we are importing people from places who are simply antithetical to ours.”
In Omar’s Twitter response she added: “No lies will stamp out my love for this country or my resolve to make our union more perfect. They will just have to get used to calling me Congresswoman!”
Asked for comment, Justin Wells, Senior Executive Producer of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” told TheWrap: “Anyone who values democracy and free expression should be gravely concerned when members of Congress demand that their critics be silenced. Tucker will address this on tonight’s show.”
Watch Carlson’s commentary below.