The Shift: DHS raid on Ilhan Omar’s house is ‘exactly what a fascist police state does’

This week, federal agents raided the home of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) in Washington, D.C.

Homeland Security says the raid was “part of an ongoing federal criminal investigation” into alleged immigration fraud. Omar came to the United States in 1995, when she was 12 years old. She became a U.S. citizen five years later, when she was still a minor.

The Wall Street Journal confirms that the goal of the investigation is to strip the Trump critic of her citizenship and deport her.

“Make no mistake: this is an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement,” said Omar in a statement. “For ten years, Trump has targeted me with baseless lies and smear campaigns. This is just the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation.”

That’s all quite obviously true. Omar is actually the 17th Democrat to be probed by the Trump administration, but there’s some additional context worth noting in this particular case.

Omar isn’t just one of the President’s many political opponents; she’s also from Somalia, a country that the right has consistently cited while pushing its racist attacks on immigrant communities.

She’s also one of the only members of the House who have consistently criticized the U.S./Israel relationship. Recall that, after Omar’s 2019 tweet alluding to AIPAC’s election spending, Trump declared that the Congress member should “apologize” to the “people of Israel.”

There’s a very good chance that Trump’s latest abuse of power will backfire.

The night of the raid, Minneapolis residents and community leaders held a rally in support of Omar at a local park. “It’s certainly stoking the same kind of unity feeling that people felt during Metro Surge more than it is anything else,” Minnesota state Senator Erin Quade told The New Republic.

The move has also further galvanized the Democrats, less than three weeks before the midterms.

“The Trump administration’s raid on Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s home is deeply disturbing and raises serious questions about the continued corrupt weaponization of the federal government against [the president’s] adversaries,” reads a joint statement from Democratic House leadership. “For years, Donald Trump and far-right extremists have relentlessly targeted Congresswoman Omar with vile personal attacks and baseless accusations. Now, less than 30 days until the midterm election, his violent mass deportation machine has descended upon the home of a duly elected member of Congress and her family.”

“DHS raiding a member of Congress’s home is exactly what a fascist police state does,” declared Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI).

At The Intercept, Natasha Lennard says the raid could be a sign of things to come, as Trump’s approval rating continues to plummet amid a bad economy and a deeply unpopular war. She calls for mass opposition to counter this flailing authoritarianism.

“It is not enough to vote in November, then cross our fingers for two more years. Organizers on the front lines defending immigrant neighbors against ICE are exhausted and need numbers and support,” writes Lennard. “Activists facing trial or already sentenced to decades in prison for resisting Trump’s regime need ongoing legal support and funding. Readiness is all.”

“This is not to suggest that we must live in a state of paralyzing fear of an ever more delusional tyrant. The point, rather, is to recognize the danger and go on,” she continues. “Resistance to Trump, to the border regime, and to racist state violence already exists; it must be supported, expanded, and the subject of an escalation of our own.”

Harris on Israel

In recent newsletters, I’ve written about ex-Biden officials rewriting history to obscure or justify their connections to the genocide in Gaza.

The most notable example is former Vice President Kamala Harris, who is probably going to run for President yet again.

Speaking at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul this week, Harris told the crowd that the United States had “fallen short” on its “moral obligation to human rights and failed “to use our leverage to curtail the Israeli government’s horrific conduct in the war in Gaza, both under the current administration – which offers Netanyahu a blank check – and our administration before, where we should have acted sooner and more forcefully.”

In a podcast appearance last year, Harris said that the Biden administration could have done more to protect civilians in Gaza.

Obvious questions arise.

If Harris sincerely believed that the Biden administration could have done more to reel in the Israeli government, then why did she repeatedly say that she wouldn’t change a single Biden-era policy if elected? Why is she finally acknowledging that the U.S. government has the power to act a full three years into the genocide?

Most importantly, regarding her potential presidential campaign, what policies does she actually support that would deliver relief for Palestinians in any capacity? Conditioning military aid? Support for the ‘Block the Bombs’ Act? An arms embargo? This is never specified.

60% of Americans now have an unfavorable view of Israel, and those numbers continue to rise as the Trump/Netanyahu war on Iran rages on with no end in sight. Harris’s comments feel like a clear political pivot, but it’s unlikely that voters will be swayed by some tepid rhetoric.

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