Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) won her primary campaign in Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District yesterday evening by 15%. But on Truth Social, the social media site owned by for President Donald Trump, some conservatives are calling the election rigged.
Omar’s win comes after defeats for two high profile members of “The Squad,” the name for the now-dwindling collection of progressive Democratic members in the House of Representatives, who were once seen as the vanguard of a younger, more Democratic socialist infused flank of the party.
After Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) got handily beaten at the end of June by Westchester County executive George Latimer and Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) lost by a slimmer margin to Wesley Bell on Aug. 6, many conservative opponents saw Omar as a ripe for a take down. It didn’t hurt that the primary was an open primary, meaning anybody in Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District can vote in it.
“If you live in Minnesota’s 5th District, you MUST vote in the Open Democrat primary this Tuesday, August 13th to remove @IlhanMN from office,” posted pro-Trump influencer Laura Loomer on X Monday, echoing a campaign to try and oust her that percolated on the right. “Republicans, Independents and Democrats have a once in a lifetime opportunity to remove a HAMAS supporter from Congress.”
The online effort though, didn’t seem to inspire any real world impact, as Omar won her primary not long after polls closed.
On Truth Social, though, posters fixated on the speed with which votes were counted in her district, claiming that the reporting precincts total jumped from 5% counted to 99.5% counted in just 15 minutes.
“While MN-5 was stuck at 0% for an hour, other districts were counting…By 10pm, no other districts were anywhere close to 99% counted like Omar’s 5th,” posted @LoveWorldPeace.
Other posters took that idea and ran with it.
“HOW IS IT all the candidates in the #MinnesotaPrimary had their numbers slowly inch up in increments, while #ilhanomar sat at a low percentage (5% or so) and then SUDDENLY JUMPED up to 99% instantaneously?” posted @RealRottieMom.
“They cheated as always would not expect anything less,” replied @nickcoca33.
“It’s soo frustrating. We have tried soo hard here to penetrate the corruption.
It runs very deep,” added @RealRottieMom.
The Daily Dot couldn’t independently verify the exact times that the votes came in, but the fact that Minnesota’s 5th District includes one county with over 100,000 votes, another county with just over 5,000 votes, and a third with just under 500 voters, likely accounts for the dramatic jump.
The total vote count for the district was 120,795 and 486, or 0.40% of the vote came from Ramsey County. Another 5,859, or 4.85% of the vote came from Anoka County. And 114,450, or 94.74% of the vote came from Hennepin County, including all of Minneapolis. meaning when Hennepin reported, the vote totals jumped … 95%.
But that basic logic won’t be enough to persuade Trumpers.
“Of course [she] cheated,” wrote PatriotGirl74.
This isn’t the first time conservatives accused Omar of voting fraud.
In 2020, the Minneapolis Police Department announced they were looking into claims raised by a Project Veritas video where a “community activist” called Omar Jamal said that Omar was breaking election rules by paying for ballot harvesting.
Omar denied those claims. A man, Liban Osman, later claimed that the activist offered him $10,000 to lie that he was offering people cash to vote for Omar, and a man seen allegedly taking money to vote for Omar in the video was a relative of Jamal’s who thought he was being given money to send to another relative in Somalia.
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