Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) suggested we "tear down" the supposed "systems of oppression" in the U.S. and try again.
"We cannot stop at the criminal justice system," Omar said at the Capitol last week. "We must begin the work of dismantling the whole system of oppression wherever we find it."
Human rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who like Omar was born in Somalia, has documented the horrors women face around the country to prove that the U.S. is miles ahead of much of the world when it comes to the rights of women and minorities.
"Why flee from Mogadishu, why flee from anarchy, why flee from oppression and then come to the United States, and then do all your best to turn Minnesota and the U.S. into Mogadishu?" she asked Dana Perino on Fox News. "It's one of the things that I'd like to ask her."
In her book "Infidel," Ali shares some graphic details about how women are treated in some African countries.
"In Somalia, like many countries across Africa and the Middle East, little girls are made 'pure' by having their genitals cut out," she writes. "There is no other way to describe this procedure, which typically occurs around the age of five."
Many girls, Ali continues, die during or after their excision, from infection. I won't continue transcribing the rest of the disturbing and graphic excerpt. In later chapters, Ali explains her harrowing journey to Europe to escape an arranged marriage.
Movements led by people like Rep. Omar, Ali said, don't serve us.
"You've come to America in search of freedom, you've come to America in search of equality, we find it here," she explained. "Our system is not perfect, we can fix it, and we do it through conversations."
America, Ali reminded Omar, is the one nation that has abolished slavery, the one nation that has stood up for civil rights and has passed laws and allocated huge resources to achieve free equality.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member