This week, Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama compared Zohran Mamdani’s mayorship of New York City to the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.
“The enemy is inside the gates,” he posted. Later, Tuberville, a former head football coach at Auburn University, felt compelled to clarify his statement. “To be clear, I didn’t ‘suggest’ Islamists are the enemy,” he posted. “I said it plainly.”
This is not the first time Tuberville has made Islamophobic remarks. Earlier this year, when Ghazala Hashmi became the first Muslim lieutenant governor of Virginia, Tuberville made the same statement. And in December, after the deadly mass shooting targeting Jews in Australia’s Bondi Beach, he said, “Islam is not a religion. It's a cult,” adding, “We've got to SEND THEM HOME NOW or we'll become the United Caliphate of America.”
When The Independent asked Tuberville about those remarks at the time and the fact that Alabama, where he is now running for governor, is home to 22,000 Muslims, he said, “If we have Muslims that come here and assimilate and go by our laws and our Constitution, I need them to help me fight back against the people that are not here for that reason.”
And Tuberville is not alone. Earlier this week, Rep. Andy Ogles of Tennessee posted on X that, “Muslims don't belong in American society,” adding that “Pluralism is a lie.” This is also not the first time that Ogles has engaged in rampant Islamophobia. Last year, after Mamdani won the Democratic nomination for mayor, Ogles called for him to be denaturalized and deported.
And these sentiments are not new among some Republicans.
The difference is that in the past, Republicans took great lengths to say that they opposed radical Islamic terrorism, but not Islam as a whole. In 2015, when then-presidential candidate Donald Trump called for a “total and complete shutdown” on Muslims coming into the United States, Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan denounced the remarks.
And with the United States engaged in war with Iran, Republican diatribes against Muslims will surely become more common in the party.
But this week, during the House GOP’s retreat — held at Trump National Doral, no less — House Speaker Mike Johnson responded to questions about the rhetoric by saying that while he spoke with those Republicans about “our tone and our messaging ... there's a lot of energy in the country and a lot of popular sentiment that the demand to impose Sharia Law in America is a serious problem.”
Johnson said it is “different language than I would use” — the same refrain he used when Trump uttered a slur for people with disabilities — and then all but gave his imprimatur on the language. This is a sharp break from when his predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, stripped Steve King of his committee assignments for racist rhetoric.
Essentially, thanks to Trump, this rhetoric is now standard fare.
Unsurprisingly, after a suspect named Ayman Mohamad Ghazali rammed his vehicle into a Michigan synagogue Thursday, Rep. Randy Fine of Florida said, “We need more Islamophobia, not less,” and that “fear of Islam is rational.”
Like Ogles and Tuberville, this is far from Fine’s first time spewing anti-Muslim rhetoric. Earlier this year, he responded to a Muslim activist in New York who called dogs “unclean” by saying, “If they force us to choose, the choice between dogs and Muslims is not a difficult one.”
All of these remarks generated justifiable outrage among Democratic lawmakers, pundits and commentators. But none of that truly matters. Fine, Tuberville and Ogles all hail from staunchly Republican areas. If anything, they will likely be rewarded for their anti-Muslim rhetoric from their constituents.
What matters most is what congressional leadership thinks.
Speaker Johnson has shown an occasional willingness to smack down members of the conference for bad behavior. He did so last week with Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas, whom he encouraged to not seek re-election amid Gonzales admitting an extramarital affair with a married staffer. But neither he nor Senate Majority Leader John Thune has taken any steps to reprimand their troops.
So expect more Islamophobia from Republicans.
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