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Minnesota GOP Apologizes for Inflammatory Ellison Post

District party called Ellison a ‘Muslim goat humper’

The Minnesota 7th Congressional District Republican Party was criticized for posting an Islamophobic image of Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn.. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call file photo) 
The Minnesota 7th Congressional District Republican Party was criticized for posting an Islamophobic image of Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn.. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call file photo) 

Minnesota Republicans found themselves in trouble after one local party posted an Islamophobic image of Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison on its Facebook page.

The image, posted on Monday, showed Ellison on a turkey hunt with Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson, and text at the bottom called Ellison “Minnesota’s head Muslim goat humper” before asking, ‘Does this mean Muslim refugees coming to Western Minnesota?”

The post also called Ellison, who is the first Muslim elected to Congress, an “anti-Semite, anti-white, racist and fascist.”

Jennifer Carnahan, chairwoman of the Minnesota Republican Party, told the Star Tribune in Minneapolis that the person, who she wouldn’t identify, who posted “has been identified … and they no longer represent our party. They resigned immediately.”

Carnahan, who was adopted from South Korea, was elected chairwoman of the state party on Saturday and used her election as a sign of diversity in the GOP.

At the time Carnahan said the state Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party was “going to have a really hard time calling us the party of racists and sexists. Look at who our party base just elected.”

But after the image was posted, Ken Martin, the state’s DFL party chair, called out Carnahan’s message.

“Just days after the newly elected GOP Chairwoman Jennifer Carnahan proclaimed that people are ‘going to have a really hard time calling us the party of racists and sexists,’ an official Minnesota Republican Party Facebook page featured a racist, hate-filled post about Congressman Keith Ellison,” he said.

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