The president’s popularity is crumbling, Americans’ salaries are under constant pressure, and the USA is waging a pointless, useless, unpopular war in the Middle East. The Republicans are betting on that virulent Islamophobia can rekindle the enthusiasm of an exhausted base. The 2000s never really ended – they just became significantly more online.
Capitol Hill was rocked this week by a series of Islamophobic comments from Rep. Andy Ogles. The Tennessee Republican has developed a solid reputation as a MAGA hardliner who cares less about legislating and more about throwing culture war grenades into the news cycle and attracting attention. On Monday, he threw another really big one: “Muslims do not belong in American society. Pluralism is a lie,” Ogles wrote on social media.
The post was the latest in a long series of Islamophobic posts from the MP. His most recent pinned post on X was a poll asking users whether they agreed that “Islamic immigration is a threat to the United States.” Earlier this month, he wrote that “America and Islam are incompatible” and that it was “time for a Muslim ban.” A graphic he shared on Monday described Islam as a religion of “rape,” “pedophilia,” “beheadings,” “female genital mutilation” and “jihad.” Ogles also shared numerous comments from fellow conservatives who defended his diatribe.
Islam hatred as a strategy
Regrettably, though unsurprisingly, Ogles is part of a large and growing group of Republicans who are using Islamophobic rhetoric as a way to continue to incite fear of non-whites and cultural difference. At the same time, they are sidestepping the growing thorns of last year’s Trump administration immigration policies, which are so unpopular that the White House is now reportedly advising Republicans to stop talking about mass deportations.
Last month, Rep. Randy Fine (R-Fla.) staged a public show in which he declared that if he had to choose between “dogs and Muslims,” the decision would be “not a difficult one.” He then introduced legislation to protect “puppies from sharia law” (whatever that means). On Tuesday, Fine told Newsmax that New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who is Muslim, should be deported.
“I have one word: deport. The fact is that Mamdani hates America. He should have his citizenship revoked and deported,” Fine said, adding, “Apparently everyone who voted for him has forgotten 9/11.”
Trump and the Muslim ban
Trump has also launched attacks on Muslim communities and activists, targeting Somali-American communities in Minnesota – despite the majority of those affected having legal residency status. At a Cabinet meeting in December, Trump described Somali migrants as “trash” being allowed into the country. The administration has revived the “Muslim ban,” which restricts immigration from Muslim-majority countries that Trump introduced in his first term, while targeting Palestinian immigrants as part of its crackdown on anti-Israel activists.
The Republican Party is even formally organizing against Islam. “Ogles’ language reflects much of what has come from its members since the so-called Sharia Free America Caucus was formed in December,” Corey Saylor, research and advocacy director at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), told Rolling Stone.
The Sharia Free America Caucus was founded last year by Representatives Keith Self and Chip Roy, both Republicans from Texas, and now includes over 40 members – all Republicans. Members of the caucus have introduced bills in Congress that would effectively ban the practice of Islam in the United States and ban Muslims from immigrating to the country. Self once declared that Muslims were “tearing apart the fabric of American values of faith, family and freedom.”
A long history of hate
The club dedicated solely to Islamophobia did not emerge from nothing. The United States has a long history of Islamophobia, and a resurgence of this kind of hatred has been bubbling up across the country for a while.
CAIR Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell noticed the resurgence over a year ago. “We began to hear claims that Muslims were trying to take over the country and impose Sharia law, that all American Muslims were part of the Muslim Brotherhood and a secret conspiracy to take over America, that Muslim private schools needed to be closed, that mosques were untrustworthy, that Muslims were creating Sharia enclaves.”
In Texas, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and state lawmakers embarked on a public anti-Islam crusade that targeted a Muslim community development near Dallas, designated CAIR as a foreign terrorist organization, unleashed a flurry of anti-Islam legislation and provided a Steve Bannon-approved blueprint for other states seeking to stoke xenophobic sentiment ahead of a potentially devastating midterm election cycle for the GOP.
Election year rhetoric and the “Muslim scare”
“It’s an election year. In any election year, we expect to see an uptick in Islamophobic rhetoric because politicians in certain states and in certain races see Muslim terror as a useful tool to win votes,” explains Mitchell, pointing out that the conflict in Gaza has also led to a boom in anti-Islamic incitement. “People feel much more free to say what they think today than they did five years ago [Rep.] Randy Fine is or [Rep.] Keith Self and others – the Republican Party is dominated by Trump, a man with a long history of Islamophobic rhetoric.”
This week, a Washington Post investigation found that since the start of 2025, more than 100 members of Congress have mentioned Muslims or Islam in social media posts. “Two-thirds of these posts mentioned radical Islam, sharia law, extremism or terrorism,” the report said.
The image that the average American has of “Sharia law” is often linked to the post-9/11 panic over Islamic extremism and differs significantly from its everyday religious meaning.
What Sharia really means
“Sharia is an Arabic word that literally means ‘the way,’” explains Mitchell. “It refers to the rules that Muslims follow. If Muslims pray five times a day, fast during Ramadan, do not drink alcohol or eat pork, we are all following Sharia. Just like a Jew who follows Halacha or a Christian who goes to mass and follows canon law.”
Because the United States is a secular state, religious law is theoretically not enforced by the state in areas such as criminal law, commerce, and economics. Republicans love to fuss over the perceived threat of Muslims seeking to impose sharia law on American society, but the same party has sought to impose Bible teaching and the Ten Commandments in public, secular educational institutions. “I don’t think they really think Muslims are trying to impose their Islamic law on everyone, nor do they think it’s possible – but it’s politically convenient for them to invoke Muslim terror,” Mitchell adds.
Although similar comments from other lawmakers were met with near-total silence from the GOP for months, Ogles’ comments eventually sparked a touch of much-needed dissent within the party. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) told Huffpost that Ogles’ statements were “ridiculous” and, “Once you name one religion” for expulsion, “then you start naming multiple religions, right? That’s just not what America is.” Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) told Axios that “the Constitution says there shall be no religious qualification test for holders of public office or government positions, and I think that applies to citizenship as well.”
Johnson is silent, the base cheers
As always, however, you can count on certain parts of the MAGA base to defend the indefensible. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) refused to condemn Ogles, instead telling reporters that there was “a lot of energy in the country and a widespread belief that the demand to implement sharia law in America is a serious problem.”
That’s not her. She never was in this country. The real problem, according to Saylor, is the Republican attack on a religion. “Many people in the upper echelons of the Republican Party,” he says, “would be willing to completely abandon the ideals of the Founding Fathers and return to the idea that America is for people who think a certain way, look a certain way, pray a certain way and have their roots in certain places.”
It’s a cyclical struggle that American minorities have endured since the nation’s founding — and the current Republican Party appears determined to undo any progress made.
