Ilhan Omar Is Mother

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LISTENING: to the crickets outside my mom's house
FEELING: crampy and overwhelmed
SEEING: my new, glorious nail set

Federal agents raided the home of Rep. Ilhan Omar Monday. They are questioning her U.S. citizenship. Trying to figure out how to revoke it because she is an immigrant. This is happening to a sitting congresswoman. A refugee. A fighter for human rights. A mother.

Where the hell is this country headed? And how safe are the rest of us?

Omar is one of the few politicians left in this country who hasn't wavered from her commitment to the people. To her constituents. I'm sure the president would love to replace her with someone who supports the fossil fuel industry, AI data centers, and all the dirty extraction sending us backward.

Still, Omar hasn't let the threats and the fear I'm sure she feels stop her mission. And, inspiringly, neither has her daughter.

I first heard about Isra Hirsi when the youth climate strikes popped off in 2019. The now 23-year-old helped launch that movement years ago when she was just a teen. She didn't flaunt her mother's credentials or name recognition. She paved her own path — around climate justice and liberation. In 2024, at the height of the pro-Palestine college encampments, Barnard College suspended Hirsi for her activism.

She fights for the planet and a free Palestine? I'd be proud as hell if that were my kid. I've never interviewed Hirsi (hit me up if you're reading this!), but I know the company she kept. And these were kids who went beyond the traditional environmentalism that raised me.

Now, they've grown up to become young adults hell-bent on defeating a system that has long oppressed the vulnerable and taken advantage of the poor. They get that combating climate change will take more than recycling our plastic bottles and cleaning the ocean. It will require taking down centuries-old systems of colonization and capitalism. It will require building a new system.

Mothers like Omar helped raise these kids. And there's nothing more threatening to an old white misogynist in power than a mother fighting for the next generation. Unfortunately for the president, Omar won't back down easily. A mother rarely does. 🌀

Currently Reading

I'm really proud of the work the team over at Neighbors has been putting out. This week, we published our first comic — all about El Niño. The art was created by Heather Langley, the script and story by Zoe Mendelson. The edits by yours truly. We also published a gorgeous photo essay last week by Nīa MacKnight. I'm so grateful for this work! It's not quite journalism but is in direct service to the L.A. environmental justice community. It's been a real pleasure to help shape this work.

For an upcoming Neighbors story, I commissioned Johnnie Jae, an Otoe-Missouria and Choctaw journalist. Now imagine my delight when I caught her name on this Truthout article! The content itself is hard to read; the piece is about Indigenous erasure. But Johnnie writes with such authority and accessibility. A must-read in the days after Indigenous Peoples' Day.

We're living in truly insane times when the government turns its back on endangered species it worked so hard to protect. Marlow Sterling writes for Sierra Magazine about the future of manatees.

I work a lot on issues relating to mental health for the CARES Media Initiative with the Climate Psychology Alliance of North America, but I've always struggled to wrap my head around the idea of moral injury. This TIME piece by clinical psychologist Michael Valdovinos characterized its long-term social risks perfectly: "Over time, repeated exposure without accountability produces one of three reactions: hardening, numbing, or withdrawal. Some people double down and justify what they see. Others detach entirely. Many simply stop believing that moral action matters"

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- Yessenia x