Omar, elected during the last Midterm elections with other freshman representatives including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who call themselves “The Squad”, says that they have a lot in common with the Tea Party movement in terms of motivation.
“We look at the negative aspects of the Tea Party and not really at the part of them that spoke to the American people, that made them feel like there were people actively fighting for them,” Omar said in an interview published Friday by Politico Magazine.
She referred to the so-called “Squad”, which also includes Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, all of whom were elected during the latest midterms.
“There’s a resemblance there. A lot of us are not that much different in our eagerness to want to come here and fight for our constituents, fight for the American ideals we believe in,” she said.
“The Squad” and their colleagues whose political opinions differ from the mainstream Democratic party agenda have regularly vexed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and more moderate members of Congress. Some of their proposals, including the Green New Deal and Medicare for all, have been criticized both by members of their own party and by the Republican opposition.
US President Trump recently addressed the new socialist-oriented wave in his State of the Union speech, claiming that “America will never be a socialist country” and that the country was founded on liberty and independence — “not government coercion, domination, and control.”
