Republicans oust Rep. Ilhan Omar from Foreign Affairs Committee - NBC News

WASHINGTON — House Republicans connected Thursday voted to oust Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., from the Foreign Affairs Committee — the latest skirmish successful a long-running partisan conflict implicit committee assignments. 

Speaker Kevin McCarthy initially had faced a fistful of GOP defections, but by Thursday helium and his squad had whipped GOP members backmost successful line, and 218 Republicans voted to backmost the solution condemning Omar for past antisemitic comments and removing her from the committee.

One Republican, Rep. Dave Joyce, R-Ohio, a elder subordinate of the Ethics Committee, voted present.

All 211 Democrats unified down Omar, who gave an affectional and defiant level code earlier the ballot that near galore of her colleagues successful tears.

"There is this thought that you are a fishy if you are an immigrant, oregon if you are from definite parts of the satellite oregon a definite tegument tone, oregon a Muslim. It is nary mishap that members of the Republican Party accused the archetypal achromatic president, Barack Obama, of being a concealed Muslim," said Omar, a Somali exile who made past arsenic 1 of the archetypal 2 Muslim American women elected to Congress.

"Well, I americium Muslim," she added. "I americium an immigrant, and interestingly, from Africa. Is anyone amazed that I americium being targeted? Is anyone amazed that I americium someway deemed unworthy to talk astir American overseas policy? Or that they spot maine arsenic a almighty dependable that needs to beryllium silenced?"

Republicans defended their action, arguing that Omar's antisemitic tropes she made respective years agone disqualified her from serving connected Foreign Affairs. In 2019, Omar infuriated Democrats and Republicans alike — arsenic good arsenic Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — erstwhile she tweeted that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and different Jewish donors were paying politicians to backmost Israel, saying: “It’s each astir the Benjamins baby.”

She besides came nether fire from chap Democrats aft they said she equated the “United States and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban.”

"How tin idiosyncratic not welcomed by 1 of our astir important allies service arsenic an emissary of American overseas argumentation connected the Foreign Affairs Committee?" said Rep. Max Miller, R-Ohio, a erstwhile Trump White House adjutant who is Jewish and who authored Thursday's resolution. "And fixed her biased comments against Israel and against the Jewish people, however tin she service arsenic an nonsubjective decision-maker connected the committee?"

Others argued that Democrats took akin actions 2 years agone erstwhile they voted to oust 2 Republicans from their committees implicit racist and convulsive societal media posts, and then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi blocked 2 different Republicans from serving connected the prime Jan. 6 panel.

Those comments infuriated 1 of Omar’s closest allies, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., who had been targeted successful a societal media station by Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., and who took to the level Thursday to obstruction against Republicans.

“Consistency? There is thing accordant with the Republican party’s continued attacks, but for the racism and incitement of unit against women of colour successful this body,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “I had a subordinate of the Republican caucus endanger my beingness and you all— and the Republican caucus rewarded him with one of the astir prestigious committee assignments successful this Congress.”

The ballot to region Omar astir didn't happen. Last week, respective Republicans voiced absorption to the GOP taking enactment against Omar, threatening to derail the solution fixed their new, razor-thin majority.

But this week, those defectors began to autumn successful line. On Tuesday, Rep. Victoria Spartz, R-Ind., flipped her ballot to yes aft gathering with McCarthy and securing connection successful the Omar solution that would springiness lawmakers a accidental to entreaty removal from committees.

Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., who was connected the fence, said helium would backmost the resolution. On Wednesday, Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., said helium would alteration his ballot to yes aft talking to McCarthy, saying the talker appeared unfastened to a projected regularisation alteration that would marque it harder to footwear lawmakers disconnected of committees.

Moments earlier the vote, Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, the lone GOP holdout, emerged from McCarthy’s bureau and announced she would besides ballot yes. Mace said she got a committedness from McCarthy to make a amended process to region members from committees.

"We person a process contiguous for [censure]. We person a process contiguous to expel members from the Congress," Mace told reporters. "We don't person a process to region members from their committee."

Speaking to reporters aft the vote, McCarthy said helium had conscionable spoken with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., astir appointing members of some parties to a moving radical that would travel up with a connection spelling retired the reasons wherefore lawmakers could beryllium removed from committees and the process for doing it. McCarthy said helium would name Mace and Buck. 

“Moving forward, each azygous subordinate of Congress has a work to however they transportation themselves. And it’s liable upon america to fto them cognize what that is,” the talker said.

“So I’m going to enactment a radical of Democrats that Hakeem volition prime and a radical of Republicans, and we’ll enactment to clarify the rules and walk thing for not lone this Congress but aboriginal congresses arsenic well.”

McCarthy argued that the House’s enactment didn’t magnitude to a “tit-for-tat” against Democrats — Republicans volition let Omar to service connected different committees, helium said.

But Omar's ouster represents conscionable the latest illustration of however committee assignments person been utilized by some parties during the past 2 years to punish lawmakers who transverse the line.

It started successful February 2021, erstwhile House Democrats — and 11 Republicans — voted to boot far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., from 2 committees for past societal media posts that dispersed racist and antisemitic conspiracy theories and threatened unit against Pelosi and Obama.

Months later, Democrats besides moved to censure and oust Gosar from his 2 committees aft helium tweeted an animated video depicting him sidesplitting Ocasio-Cortez and attacking President Joe Biden.

That aforesaid year, Pelosi unilaterally blocked 2 of McCarthy’s picks — Reps. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Jim Banks, R-Ind. — from the prime committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack; McCarthy and Republicans past boycotted the peculiar panel.

At the time, Republicans warned that Democrats would regret those decisions. When Republicans took backmost power of the House this year, they instantly reinstated Greene and Gosar to committees.

McCarthy past blocked 2 of Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries’ picks for the Intelligence Committee: erstwhile Chairman Adam Schiff and Rep. Eric Swalwell, some California Democrats who played cardinal roles successful the Trump impeachment proceedings. 

And connected Thursday, McCarthy made bully connected his committedness to footwear Omar from the Foreign Affairs sheet arsenic well.

“Rep. Omar surely has made mistakes. She has utilized antisemitic tropes that were intelligibly and unequivocally condemned by House Democrats erstwhile it took spot 4 years ago,” Jeffries told reporters.

But helium called Thursday's ballot "not a nationalist argumentation debate. It’s not astir accountability. It’s astir governmental revenge."