Following the incident at Ilhan Omar’s Minneapolis town hall, President Donald Trump publicly questioned its legitimacy, suggesting, without evidence, that the congresswoman had staged the encounter.
On January 27, 2026, U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar was speaking at a town hall meeting in Minneapolis when a man in the audience rushed toward her and sprayed her with liquid from a syringe, prompting security to tackle and detain him. The 55-year-old suspect, later identified as Anthony Kazmierczak, sprayed what was reported to be apple cider vinegar at Omar’s shirt before being restrained.
Omar responded firmly to Trump’s remarks, telling CNN that his comments revealed a lack of compassion. She contrasted her own response to a past assassination attempt on Trump in 2024, when she condemned the violence and called it a tragedy with what she described as his dismissive attitude toward her experience.
In her interview, Omar also criticized Trump’s rhetoric more broadly, pointing to what she said was a pattern of inflammatory language that has coincided with threats against her and members of her Somali-American community. She linked such rhetoric to a rise in hostility and pointed to recent domestic controversies, including fatal federal actions in Minneapolis that drew her criticism.
Omar went on to raise concerns about Trump’s fitness for office, even alluding to the 25th Amendment, and suggested that his repeated attacks on her have contributed to a climate of danger for lawmakers from minority communities. The White House did not immediately offer a comment on her statements.
