Fact check: Trump says Rep. Omar 'proud' of al Qaeda

President Donald Trump made a baseless claim and mischaracterized the remarks of Rep. Ilhan Omar during a campaign rally Wednesday night, painting the Minnesota Democrat as a fan of the terrorist group al Qaeda.

“You say al Qaeda, it makes you proud, al Qaeda makes you proud!” Trump said of Omar. “You don't speak that way about America.”

Omar, a Somali American who is the first representative to wear a hijab, is one of four Democratic representatives who refer to themselves as "The Squad" and have been harshly critical of the president.

Trump has made the group of liberal lawmakers a target of his attacks as he campaigns for re-election, and spent a significant amount of time remarking on them at his rally in Greenville, North Carolina.

The attack came just hours after some House Democrats supported a failed impeachment push in the House over what the chamber had condemned a day earlier as Trump's "racist comments" about the Minnesota Democrat and her three other liberal colleagues of color.

There is no evidence that Omar has said the terrorist group responsible for the 9/11 attacks makes her proud, and fact checkers have searched high and low for proof. Conservative outlets have pointed to a 2013 interview Omar gave in which she condemned terrorism broadly but argued that Muslim communities should not be blamed for the acts of radicalized individuals, but nowhere in the interview does she express support for terrorists.

“And at a press conference just this week, when asked whether she supported al Qaeda, that's our enemy — that's our enemy,” Trump said in his attack Wednesday. “She refused to answer. She didn't want to give an answer to that question.”

But here’s what Omar said at the news conference earlier this week about Trump's repeated accusations that she is supportive of al Qaeda: “I will not dignify it with an answer."

She continued: "I do not expect every time there is a white supremacist who attacks, or there is a white man who kills in a school or in a movie theater or in a mosque or in a synagogue, I don’t expect my white community members to respond on whether they love that person or not. And so I think it is beyond time … to ask Muslims to condemn terrorists.”

Omar is answering the question, although perhaps not in a way that Trump would have liked.

For Subscribers

FOR SUBSCRIBERSRecords reveal tumultuous marriage between killed New York Times executive and wife

FOR SUBSCRIBERSFrom clean energy warrior to ‘wall of shame,’ James Talarico reverses on a fossil fuel money pledge

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCongressional staff planned official trip with luxury stops in Italy and France weeks before election

FOR SUBSCRIBERSA harrowing ordeal aboard an Israel-bound plane

FOR SUBSCRIBERSOpenAI CEO Sam Altman to skip congressional hearing on rogue AI agents

FOR SUBSCRIBERSKey DOJ lawyers departed Trump ‘grand conspiracy’ probe amid pressure to produce, source says

FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump’s new AI chatbot often links to a site launched under Clinton 26 years ago

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAt MAHA summit, industry CEOs the movement once vilified take the stage

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThis Paralympian has two goals: Win medals and give away $500,000 to her teammates

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCornell rape allegation spotlights stringent New York state laws that have long drawn criticism

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe debate over AI’s future rages on both coasts

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDecades-old march dispute reignites in Northern Ireland, threatening political crisis

FOR SUBSCRIBERSMore oil is getting out of the Middle East. Why is it still so expensive?

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe complicated bargain between ‘looksmaxxing’ influencer Clavicular and the women in his orbit

FOR SUBSCRIBERSSenators unveil bipartisan bill to deliver essential newborn supply kits to new moms

For Subscribers

FOR SUBSCRIBERSRecords reveal tumultuous marriage between killed New York Times executive and wife

FOR SUBSCRIBERSFrom clean energy warrior to ‘wall of shame,’ James Talarico reverses on a fossil fuel money pledge

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCongressional staff planned official trip with luxury stops in Italy and France weeks before election

FOR SUBSCRIBERSA harrowing ordeal aboard an Israel-bound plane

FOR SUBSCRIBERSOpenAI CEO Sam Altman to skip congressional hearing on rogue AI agents

FOR SUBSCRIBERSKey DOJ lawyers departed Trump ‘grand conspiracy’ probe amid pressure to produce, source says

FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump’s new AI chatbot often links to a site launched under Clinton 26 years ago

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAt MAHA summit, industry CEOs the movement once vilified take the stage

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThis Paralympian has two goals: Win medals and give away $500,000 to her teammates

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCornell rape allegation spotlights stringent New York state laws that have long drawn criticism

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe debate over AI’s future rages on both coasts

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDecades-old march dispute reignites in Northern Ireland, threatening political crisis

FOR SUBSCRIBERSMore oil is getting out of the Middle East. Why is it still so expensive?

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe complicated bargain between ‘looksmaxxing’ influencer Clavicular and the women in his orbit

FOR SUBSCRIBERSSenators unveil bipartisan bill to deliver essential newborn supply kits to new moms

At the rally Wednesday, Trump also claimed “Rep. Omar blamed the United States for the terrorist attacks on our country, saying that terrorism is a reaction to our involvement in other people's affairs."

This too is a mischaracterization of the 2013 PBS interview, in which she and host Ahmet Tharwat mused that radicalization and terrorism are a reaction to war and invasion. American involvement in "other countries' affairs," Omar asserted, fuels radicalization. The conversation was a broader discussion on terrorism, and the remark is hardly a statement of blame.

“Omar minimized the Sept. 11th attacks on our homeland, saying 'some people did something,'" Trump also said.

Omar was widely criticized for saying "some people did something" in comments about the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Muslim civil rights at a conference in March. While speaking at an event hosted by the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Los Angeles, Omar discussed how Muslim Americans had their constitutional rights and freedoms infringed upon following the 9/11 attacks, making a comment that some saw as minimizing the terrorist act.

"Here's the truth. Far too long we have lived with the discomfort of being a second-class citizen. And, frankly, I'm tired of it, and every single Muslim in this country should be tired of it," Omar said. "CAIR was founded after 9/11 because they recognized that some people did something and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties," she said.

CAIR wasn't founded after 9/11; it was founded in 1994. What's less clear is whether Omar is actually diminishing the responsibility of al Qaeda in these remarks.