MYNORTHWEST NEWS

Washington Rep. Jayapal on racism at Trump rally: ‘We have to call it out’

Jul 18, 2019, 4:12 PM

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Trump, aid checks...

Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

(Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Following cries of “send her back!” from a crowd at a rally for President Trump in Greenville, North Carolina, leaders in Washington state are speaking out.

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“I got a lot of calls from people across this country who are absolutely outraged. This is my country, I’m proud of it, and I’m being told to go home not by the guy on the street, but this time from the White House,” Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal told CNN’s Chris Cuomo.

This comes after a series of racist Tweets from Trump, where he said that a quartet of Democratic Congresswomen should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”

On Wednesday, those sentiments were renewed when a crowd at a Trump rally loudly chanted, “send her back,” referring to Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

“From a guy who deliberately put out racist Tweets, we have to call it out,” Jayapal said.

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Washington Gov. Jay Inslee echoed Jayapal’s statements Thursday morning on MSNBC.

“Republican leaders should be absolutely ashamed,” Inslee said. “We should not only be enraged at Donald Trump — we should be massively disappointed in the Republican senators and members of Congress and mayors who are not standing up when they’re called to stand up.”

While Trump didn’t actively quiet the crowd’s chants, he said Thursday that he “was not happy with it.” On Twitter, he also insisted the Tweets that started this saga were not racist, and that he “doesn’t have a racist bone” in his body.

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Washington Rep. Jayapal on racism at Trump rally: ‘We have to call it out’