What are Student’s Views on Ilhan Omar?
Tweets from Ilhan Omar indicating some of the controversial things that she has said.
From giving hundreds of millions of dollars to enemies, to sex scandals in the White House, and all the way to Twitter scandals by representatives, controversies happen everywhere in politics. Ilhan Omar is a Somali born, U.S. Representative for Minnesota’s 5th congressional district, who tends to be a controversial topic. Although Ilhan Omar is a Minnesota representative, this still could affect us because if this can happen in one state, it can happen in another. Some of her most recent controversies go from calling the terrorist attacks that took place on September 11, 2001, “some people who did something,” all the way back to 2012 when she tweeted out “Israel has hypnotized the world.” But the question on my mind, is what do the students at Arlington High School feel about Ilhan Omar?
Alex Hurley (12) is one of the few people at this school who knows who Ilhan Omar is. “I don’t believe she has the qualifications to make a U.S. representative,” Alex said, “based on her comments and inaccurate facts that she’s stated over and over again.”
One of the topics that is focused on a lot by the right is her immigration policies. Omar believes that the immigration system that we have currently is not just. The amount of children being stranded at the border is too high, ICE is deporting way too many people, immigrants are being arrested at higher rates, and we let 3.6 million illegal children into this country every year. Her plan is to abolish ICE, prevent President Trump from withholding federal funding, and to fight back against criminalizing illegal immigration [1].
Not all people who know about Ilhan Omar hate her. In fact, Grace Williams (11) feels the opposite way about her. Although her slip ups should not be forgotten, they should be forgiven. “I feel that she is definitely the right step in a direction towards more equality between gender, religion, et cetera” Grace said.
Although our political views may not line up with everyone else’s, it’s always important to respect the opinions of others. Politics should never get in the way of friendships. Controversies happen in both our daily lives, and in politics all the time.
