Diverging from other prominent Republicans and echoing many Democrats, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy admonished President Donald Trump for a series of Sunday tweets in which the president implied that certain congresswomen were not born in America and suggested that "they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came."
"POTUS was wrong to say any American citizen, whether in Congress or not, has any 'home' besides the U.S.," the Republican from Hays County, Texas, said in a tweet Sunday night. Still he added that "Reps who refuse to defend America should be sent home 1{020."
Trump was targeting four House Democrats who, like Roy were first elected to Congress last year: Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. Only one of them, Omar, was born outside the United States, in Somalia.
Democrats were quick to slam the president on Twitter and on morning talk shows over what they called racist rhetoric. But, most top Republicans have remained largely silent on the president's tweets.
In the series of tweets sent at around 5:30 a.m. Sunday, the president said, "So interesting to see 'Progressive' Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run."
Roy historically hasn't been shy attacking both Democrats and Republicans, most notably on issues relating to border security. But the congressman seemed to hedge his position Monday morning, retweeting the president who doubled down on his position amid outrage over the tweets, saying "When will the Radical Left Congresswomen apologize to our Country, the people of Israel and even to the Office of the President, for the foul language they have used, and the terrible things they have said. So many people are angry at them & their horrible & disgusting actions!"
Texas Republican U.S. Reps. Will Hurd of Helotes, who has been a vocal critic of the president's border security proposals, and Pete Olson of Sugar Land also chimed in with their criticism of Trump's tweets.
In an interview with CNN, Hurd called the tweets "racist," "xenophobic" and "unbecoming of the leader of the free world."
Olson urged Trump to "immediately disavow his comments" and added that the tweets were "not reflective of the values of the 1,000,000+ people in Texas 22."
