Rep. Justin Amash (Mich.), who recently left the Republican Party to become an Independent, on Sunday lambasted President Trump for telling a group of progressive congresswomen to go back to where they came from, saying it was “racist and disgusting.”
“To tell these American citizens (most of whom were born here) to ‘go back’ to the ‘crime infested places from which they came’ is racist and disgusting,” Amash said on Twitter.
The comments from Amash came just hours after Trump targeted a group of female lawmakers, saying that they should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came” before speaking out about how the United States government should be run.
{mosads}Trump did not identify the lawmakers. But the remarks came amid a week of escalating tension between Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and a group of four freshman House Democrats — Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.).
Omar was born in Mogadishu, Somalia, before coming to the U.S. as a refugee with her family. Pressley was born in Cincinnati, while Tlaib was born in Detroit. Ocasio-Cortez was born in New York. They are all U.S. citizens.
“So interesting to see ‘Progressive’ Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run,” Trump said in an early morning string of tweets.
“Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how it is done,” he added. “These places need your help badly, you can’t leave fast enough.”
Democratic lawmakers forcefully condemned the remarks. Pelosi called the comments “xenophobic,” arguing that Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan is really about “making America white again.”
Assistant Speaker Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) echoed Amash’s comments, calling Trump’s tweets “racist.”
Amash was the only member of the GOP to support Trump’s impeachment before formally leaving the party last week. Trump tweeted that it was “great news” Amash was leaving the GOP, deriding the lawmaker as the “dumbest and most disloyal” man in Congress.