Pro-Israel US congressman says ‘Muslims don’t belong in America’
A Republican member of the United States Congress has sparked widespread condemnation after declaring on social media that Muslims have no place in American society.
Andy Ogles wrote on X on Monday that “Muslims don’t belong in American society,” adding in the same post that “Pluralism is a lie.”
It was not immediately clear what prompted the remarks. However, social media monitors reported a sharp increase in anti-Muslim content on X since Israel and the US launched their joint war on Iran on February 28.
The Washington, DC-based Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH) said it tracked posts that explicitly dehumanised, excluded, and incited violence against Muslims from 1 January to 5 March.
On the day the war began, the volume of such posts surged from just under 2,000 per day to more than 6,000, the report said.
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Ogles, a staunch supporter of Israel and a member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus, has previously floated proposals targeting Muslims. He recently said he intends to introduce legislation banning immigration from certain Muslim-majority countries.
Over the weekend he posted additional remarks on X declaring that “Diversity is our weakness” and calling for the deportation of even naturalised Muslim Americans.
'Abhorrent'
Investigative outlet Drop Site News reported last September that Israeli Foreign Ministry commissioned a global survey across the United States and several European countries to assess how to counter increasingly negative public attitudes toward Israel.
According to the report, the findings suggested that public backing for Israel increased significantly when polling questions framed issues around fear of Muslims. The survey indicated that support for Israel rose by roughly 20 percentage points under such conditions.
The Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR) condemned the remarks calling Ogles "an anti-Muslim extremist."
"Ogles is a member of the so-called 'Sharia-Free America Caucus,' a group of US representatives who support extremist legislation that would, if enacted, essentially ban the practice of Islam in the United States," the statement said.
"Islam is an American faith that has been present since the colonial-era when large numbers of Muslims were imported as slave labor, without any individual liberty or freedom of religion," said CAIR.
The comments triggered swift condemnation from Democratic lawmakers, who described the rhetoric as openly Islamophobic.
Judy Chu called the remarks “abhorrent,” while Lisa Blunt Rochester urged Republican leaders to publicly denounce the Tennessee congressman.
Katherine Clark, the House minority whip, wrote on X: “This disgusting shit doesn’t belong in American society. And Republicans who support it don’t belong in Congress.”
Ogles’s remarks come amid a broader surge of anti-Muslim rhetoric among some Republican politicians.
Last month, Randy Fine caused a backlash after writing in a social media post that he would choose dogs over Muslims. Despite calls from several Democrats for disciplinary action or resignation, Republican leaders did not sanction him.
An analysis by the The Washington Post found that nearly 100 Republican members of Congress have posted about Muslims or Islam since the beginning of the year, with the overwhelming majority of those comments framed negatively.
Many of the posts referenced themes such as “radical Islam”, extremism or deportation.
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