Trump warns of ‘jihadists’ ruling in Washington as Democrats show momentum

United States President Donald Trump has described Democratic candidates in the midterm US elections as “jihadists” in an apparent reference to Muslim Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed securing his party’s nomination for the Michigan primary elections last week.

The pronouncements fuel a proliferating wave of Islamophobic discourse among Republican lawmakers and elected officials in the sprint to lock down ballots ahead of November’s midterm elections.

“We have jihadists being elected all over the place, whether it’s communism [or] jihadism,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Monday. “A friend of mine called up, he said, ‘You know […] you should use the word jihadist’, that’s what’s happening. If you take a look at what’s happening in other countries, I’m not really sure that’s the way we want to live.”

Trump also hurled another tirade against people of Somali descent, of which there are upwards of 260,000 across the US. He called them “not smart”, and said they have “no aptitude” and “nothing going” for them to “tell us how to run our country”.

Edward Ahmed Mitchell, the national deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim civil rights and advocacy organisation in the US, said that Trump’s hateful anti-Muslim rhetoric “is putting a target on the back of Muslim elected officials across our nation” and that “this type of dangerous rhetoric is fueling the surge in complaints of anti-Muslim bigotry that our civil rights organization has documented over the past three years”.

Although the president refrained from explicitly naming any individual candidate, hours later, he focused his attention on El-Sayed, who is a son of Egyptian immigrants. The president shared a photo on Truth Social showing the Democratic contender positioned before a gathering that featured two women in headscarves, accompanied by the caption: “They are coming for your home and your belongings.”

Trump also targeted El-Sayed’s victory directly last week, calling him a “hater of Jews” and “hater of Israel” who will bring “filth, crime, death, destruction, embarrassment”.

Several other Republicans also beefed up their anti-Muslim rhetoric, following El-Sayed’s win, parroting remarks that Muslims do not belong in American society. Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina claimed on social media that “every single Muslim holding public office in America is a Trojan horse, and a threat to both national security and our republic”.

Meanwhile, Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville labelled El-Sayed a “TERRORIST” and wrote on social media that “Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed is a RADICAL ISLAMIST.”

This outburst occurred just two days after Trump shared a social media post comparing a photo of himself and First Lady Melania Trump with one of El-Sayed and his wife Dr Sarah Jukaku, who is a psychiatrist. The image was captioned: “Two VERY DIFFERENT America’s.”

Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union with host Jake Tapper on Sunday night, the Democratic Senate candidate hit back, saying, “Sarah and I actually like each other”, adding “I don’t know about the first lady and the president, but from what I’ve heard, it’s a bit of a rocky road”.

With less than 90 days to go until the highly anticipated midterm elections come to a head, and with all 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 34 Senate seats up for grabs, Democrats are confronting an ideological schism between moderate leaders and triumphing democratic progressives, some of whom are increasingly being characterised as an endangerment to Washington’s national security establishment altogether.

“People don’t want to have radical lunatics involved in running our country,” said Trump on Monday, “and that’s what we have.”