The three Muslim members of Congress said in a joint statement Tuesday they were “horrified” by a Republican proposal to expel Palestinians from the United States.
In an echo of former Donald Trump’s infamous “Muslim ban,” last week Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) introduced a bill that would bar Palestinians from traveling to the U.S. and revoke any visas issued to Palestinians in the U.S. since Oct. 1. Zinke served as Trump’s Interior secretary before coming to Congress this year.
“Let’s be clear: using the full power of the state to target and persecute a particular ethnic group or nationality is fascism and pure bigotry,” Reps. André Carson (D-Ind.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said Tuesday.
“This legislation — by a former cabinet official no less — directly violates the U.S. Constitution, and would illegally destroy the lives of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian immigrants who live in and contribute to American society,” Carson, Omar and Tlaib said.
Zinke’s legislation and the Democrats’ response come amid rising threats against Jewish and Muslim Americans in the wake of the Oct. 7 terror attack on Israel by Hamas and Israel’s subsequent siege of the Gaza Strip.
“I don’t have any malice against the Palestinians per se,” Zinke told HuffPost on Tuesday, before the Muslim lawmakers put out their statement. “I don’t have any confidence this administration will vet or screen anybody.” | 
