New House Speaker Kevin McCarthy Keeps Promise to Oust Reps Omar, Swalwell & Schiff from Committee Assignments
Edited by: Fern Sidman
Back in November, then House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) vowed during an appearance on Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures” to remove several prominent House Democrats from their committee assignments if he becomes speaker of the House, according to an Axios report.
McCarthy said at the time that if he should be chosen to be the speaker of the House of Representatives that he would not allow Reps. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) to serve on the House Intelligence Committee. Axios also reported that he added that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) wouldn’t be allowed to serve on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, citing her “anti-Semitic comments.”
“We watch anti-Semitism grow, not just on our campuses, but we watched it grow in the halls of Congress,” McCarthy added in his remarks at the time, Fox News reported.
Now, Speaker McCarthy has said that he has every intention to fulfill his pledge. Late on Monday, McCarthy said that will seek to remove the three high-profile Democrats from their House committees, as was reported by the New York Post.
Speaking to the Associated Press, McCarthy said that he would move to strip the trio of their assignments, following through on a vow of payback for Democrats ousting Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) from their panels during the last Congress, the Post reported.
In January, McCarthy said Schiff “lied to the American public” with his support of the unverified Steele dossier, which alleged extensive ties between former President Trump and Russia, as was reported by Axios.com
At the last Republican Jewish Coalition convention in Las Vegas, McCarthy said, “Last year, I promised that when I became Speaker, I would remove Rep. Ilhan Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee based on her repeated anti-Semitic and anti-American remarks. I’m keeping that promise.”
Axios reported that in 2019, Omar implied in a tweet that political support for Israel is based on campaign donations from the nation’s largest and most influential pro-Israel lobbying group, specifically AIPAC. She later apologized for her remarks.
In 2021, Omar clashed with Jewish Democrats in the House after tweeting about “unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban,” in reference to investigations by the International Criminal Court, according to the Axios report. She later clarified that she was not “equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries.” Axios also reported that Republicans have long accused Omar of anti-Semitism — a charge she denies.
McCarthy has previously tried to boot Swalwell from his committee assignment over his ties to Christine Fang, a suspected Chinese spy, as was reported by Axios.
In November, McCarthy told Fox News that “Eric Swalwell cannot get a security clearance in the public sector. Why would we ever give him a security clearance in the secrets to America? So, I will not allow him to be on Intel. You have Adam Schiff, who had lied to the American public time and again. We will not allow him to be on the Intel Committee either.”
Axios reported that Swalwell was not accused of wrongdoing and cut off ties with Fang after receiving an FBI briefing.
