Opinion

BROADCAST BIAS: Media had Omar’s number, she didn’t have WWII’s. Journalists didn’t care

Dan Quayle's 'potatoe' moment haunted him for years, but Omar's gaffe got a Newsweek 'fact check' defending her

By Tim Graham Fox News

Published May 2, 2026 8:00am EDT

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Ilhan Omar flubs line about ‘World War Eleven’

Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., is being mocked for misreading her notes in a resurfaced clip in which she referred to World War II as "World War Eleven."

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Minnesota Democrat Rep. Ilhan Omar checks so many boxes on the wokeness list: Black, female, Muslim refugee from Africa. It’s a born-on-third-base situation. Liberal journalists would consider her President Donald Trump’s worst nightmare. That’s why they celebrated her victorious first campaign for Congress in 2018.

So, when Omar messes up – an 11 on a scale of one to 10 – the media couldn’t care less. This week, the liberal congresswoman was in the news for having read World War II as "World War Eleven." It wasn’t a major gaffe, because the press chose to cover for her, instead of covering the mistake. As they have throughout her entire career.

Back on Nov. 7, 2018, CBS correspondent Jim Axelrod simply touted Omar for becoming "the first-ever Somali-American elected to Congress" at age 36. "Born in Somalia, she and her family fled the violence of civil war when she was 8. After years in a refugee camp in Kenya, she immigrated to the U.S. when she was 11, learning English in three months," he added.

On NBC, congressional correspondent Kasie Hunt rolled Omar into a report that touted gains for Democratic women. "The newest Congress featuring more than 100 women, a new record. Among them, the first Muslim women, Michigan's Rashida Tlaib and Minnesota's Ilhan........

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