Rep. Omar and Pres. Trump Hashtags Compete on Twitter

After a round of tweets by U.S. President Donald Trump about Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), saying the Somali-born representative and other congresswomen of color should “go back and help fix the crime infested places from which they came”, Twitter has been ablaze with tweets mentioning the hashtags #IStandwithIlhan and, later, #IStandWithPresTrump.

The issue got more controversial when the crowd at a Trump rally in Greenville, N.C., on July 17 chanted "send her back", directed at Omar.

Trump and Reps. Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) have been at odds for a while, mainly about legislation concerning immigration, civil rights and asylum laws. The four congresswomen, who became known as “The Squad”, represent immigrant communities and people of color in the United States. While Rep. Omar was born abroad, Reps. Ocasio-Cortez and Tlaib are the children of immigrants from Puerto Rico and Palestine.

So far, tweets mentioning #IStandWithIlhan have outnumbered ones mentioning #IStandWithPresTrump on Twitter, according to analysis tool Talkwalker.