Congresswoman Ilhan Omar has called out her House of Representatives colleague Lauren Boebert, saying she was a “buffoon” for narrating a “made up” story coloured with anti-Muslim bigotry.
The congresswoman from Minnesota rubbished the incident narrated by Ms Boebert, the representative from Colorado, a video clip of which had gone viral on social media ahead of Thanksgiving.
Ms Boebert was seen in the video talking about an alleged incident in which she was in an elevator at the Capitol building.
“I was getting into an elevator with one of my staffers and he and I, we are leaving the Capitol, we are going back to my office. And I see a Capitol police officer running hurriedly to the elevator. I see fret all over his face. And he’s reaching as the door is shutting. I can’t open it. What’s happening? I look to my left and there she is. Ilhan Omar. And I say ‘well she doesn’t have a backpack. We should be fine’,” Ms Boebert can be heard saying in the video.
“So we only had one floor to go… so I said ‘Oh look, the Jihad squad decided to show up for work today’,” she continued saying, as the crowd cheered.
“It’s just her staffers on Twitter that talk for her. She’s not tough in person,” she added.
Ms Omar, quote tweeting the video on Thursday, rubbished the allegations. “Fact, this buffoon looks down when she sees me at the Capitol, this whole story is made up. Sad she thinks bigotry gets her clout,” she said.
Ms Omar also slammed the Islamophobic remarks made by the far-right, gun-rights activist: “Anti-Muslim bigotry isn’t funny and shouldn’t be normalised. Congress can’t be a place where hateful and dangerous Muslims tropes get no condemnation.”
Ms Boebert has been called the “QAnon Congresswoman” for saying she hopes the baseless conspiracy theory — that alleges that a demonic global paedophile ring is at the centre of the actions of a majority of Democrat politicians and senior government officials — was true.
Calls for her resignation grew in January after she tweeted details about speaker Nancy Pelosi during the Capitol riots on 6 January.
