VP Pence says Rep. Omar prefers socialism to freedom in latest attack

Mike Pence found yet another reason to be offended by freshman congresswoman Ilhan Omar after she criticized the Trump administration’s effort to cripple the Venezuelan government with "death-causing" sanctions.

The vice-president went on Twitter on Thursday to accuse the Minnesota representative of “choosing socialism over freedom.” The reason – she did an interview with the online television news network Democracy Now, in which she criticized the US government’s regime change operation in Venezuela. Unlike Omar, “the Trump Administration stands with the freedom-loving people of Venezuela,” Pence proudly stated.

Omar is one of the new Democrat lawmakers often targeted by members of the Trump administration and the Republican party in general. Yet, unlike fellow Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Omar more often gets bashing for her criticism of Israeli policies – which critics interpret as anti-Semitism – rather than support of socialism.

But apparently by objecting to the harsh economic sanctions, which the Trump administration imposed on Venezuela as part of its ongoing effort to topple the socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro, Omar painted a target with a hammer and sickle somewhere on her back.

Incidentally, the interview had nothing to do with GOP’s favorite bogeyman of socialism. Omar criticized Trump’s Venezuela approach due to the toll it is taking on the very same common Venezuelan people, which Pence claimed to be on the side of. She endorsed the position of economist Jeffrey Sachs, who was an earlier guest on Democracy Now.

Sachs recently co-authored a study, which estimated that at least 40,000 Venezuelans have died for causes likely linked to the sanctions – like malnutrition, lack of medicine – since 2017, when the Trump administration kicked sanctions against the country into overdrive.

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