Rep. Ilhan Omar says Harris-Walz tapping Liz Cheney was ‘huge misstep’

Rep. Ilhan Omar stuck close to the Democratic ticket through the turbulent election year, never calling on President Joe Biden to step aside but quickly getting behind Vice President Kamala Harris when he did.

It was a show of unity from a progressive Democrat not always in tune with her party’s center, and it came amid signs that Harris and Gov. Tim Walz were shifting focus from progressive priorities in the leadup to Election Day. Now, as the Minnesota congresswoman and her allies prepare for a second Trump administration and all it could bring, she is lamenting some of her party’s missed opportunities and missteps.

Republicans “are clear about who they are fighting and who they are fighting for,” Omar said in an interview in her Capitol Hill office. “And as Democrats, we are not clear about that.”

“For me, I’ve always been clear about that. I don’t want to fight and risk losing the White House, but I also am very clear about who I fight for,” she said.

Omar, elected earlier this month to her fourth term in Congress representing Minneapolis and several of its suburbs, has become a face of the progressive movement, as deputy chair of the House Progressive Caucus and founding members of the left flank group that calls itself the Squad.

The war in Gaza left Omar, one of the fiercest critics of Israel’s actions, walking a delicate line between pressuring Biden and the Harris-Walz ticket to call for an end to the conflict, while also rooting for them to win the election.

Asked if the Democratic ticket did enough to court progressives, she said that more outreach, more policy signals and more understanding of progressive priorities “would be helpful in us winning.” The Harris-Walz campaign could have listened more to the Democratic base and may have tried too hard to reach Republican-leaning voters by tapping surrogates like former Rep. Liz Cheney, a Republican who has vocally opposed Trump, in states like Wisconsin and Michigan.

Omar called that “a huge misstep,” especially in Michigan, the home of the Uncommitted Movement, a group that emerged during the presidential primary to pressure Democrats to end the war. Omar joined them for a sit-in after DNC organizers refused to let a Palestinian speak on the convention stage.

The campaign’s association with Cheney, whose father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, heavily influential in the 2003 invasion of Iraq under President George W. Bush, sent the wrong message, she said.

“You have the one name for my generation and generations younger than me that is synonymous with war,” Omar said of Cheney. “It does say something about where your priorities are even if those are not your priorities.”

In losing Michigan, the Harris-Walz ticket also lost the city of Dearborn, a Detroit suburb that’s home to one of the largest Arab communities in the country. Omar said Trump was willing to meet with the city’s Democratic mayor while Harris and Walz only offered to send consultants or staffers.

“I think that personal touch for that community made the difference,” Omar said. “We could have had that personal touch.”

A Harris-Walz campaign official said the ticket advocated for a number of progressive policies, including expanding Medicare to lower prescription drug costs, and were backed by other progressive leaders, including fellow Squad member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

Omar declined to cast doubt in hindsight at the choice of Harris and Walz to lead the party. “They were our candidates. We worked hard to get them elected and we fell short with voters,” she said.

The new administration could present challenges for Omar. She and other members of the Squad were regular targets of Trump. Omar said she will look for ways she can collaborate with the White House, and oppose it as needed on policies she thinks are “hurtful” to her constituents and the country.

Asked what’s next for the war in Gaza under Trump, Omar fears Israel “without any hesitation” will be given the “green light” to continue and “finish their genocidal war.”

Seizing on her past comments on Israel, Republicans ousted Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee last year. And looking ahead, getting back on the committee in the next Congress is something she is weighing. “There’s still a lot of unknown,” she said.