Kevin McCarthy Pledges to Oust Ilhan Omar from Foreign Affairs Committee as Speaker

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Aaron Bandler

November 21, 2022

Alex Wong / Staff / Getty Images

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) vowed over the weekend to remove Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN) from her position on the House Foreign Affairs Committee if he is elected as the Speaker of the House.

“Last year, I promised that when I became Speaker, I would remove Rep. Ilhan Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee based on her repeated anti-semitic and anti-American remarks,” McCarthy tweeted on November 21. “I’m keeping that promise.” Twitter has a box below McCarthy’s tweet explaining that the Speaker does not have the unilateral power to remove members from committees, and that Omar would need to be removed by a majority vote among the House.

Last year, I promised that when I became Speaker, I would remove Rep. Ilhan Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee based on her repeated anti-semitic and anti-American remarks.

I'm keeping that promise. pic.twitter.com/04blBx3neD

— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) November 19, 2022

Omar has previously come under fire after tweeting in 2012 that Israel is hypnotizing the world and tweeting in 2019 that pro-Israel groups like AIPAC are “all about the Benjamins baby.”

Omar replied to McCarthy’s pledge by accusing the House Minority Leader of singling her out and that stripping her of her committee assignment “does nothing to address inflation, health care, or solve the climate crisis.”