September 2022: Negotiating a Major Public Safety Package

Dear friends,

This week, I participated in the White House’s Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. As someone who survived war and lived in a refugee camp, I know the deep pangs of hunger firsthand. I’m grateful to President Biden for leading on this issue. I won’t stop fighting until we end hunger once and for all. Let’s seize it!

Negotiating a Major Public Safety Package

Last week, the House took an important step in passing a public safety package that includes meaningful accountability, training and non-violent intervention for our communities. I was proud to negotiate major improvements to the package, ensuring funding was targeted to police departments with fewer than 125 officers, increasing funding for training, accountability, and data collection. I will continue to advocate for a holistic, evidence-based approach to keeping our communities safe, including funding for programs proven to reduce crime, like community policing and after-school programs, along with investments in education, good jobs, social services, and affordable housing will help reduce crime and keep our families and communities safe. You can read more here.

Canceling Student Loan Debt

This week, I joined my colleagues to celebrate President Biden’s executive order to cancel student debt that will benefit 43 million Americans including 730,000 Minnesotans. President Biden has made an investment that will lift the burden of millions of student loan borrowers shackled by exorbitant debt. This is an important step that will provide critical relief to millions of borrowers across the country. You can watch my remarks here.

Unionizing on Capitol Hill

Today, my office voted unanimously to form a union. As a former union member myself and someone who represents a union district in Minnesota, I am deeply proud of my staff for making their collective voices heard and voting to unionize. Unions are the bedrock of the middle class. The labor movement helped get us the 40 hour work week, the weekend, and child labor laws. Every single worker deserves a union to represent them and fight for their wages, benefits, and basic workplace protections. It is long past time the United States Congress became a unionized workplace, and that includes my own staff. You can read my statement here.

In service,

Ilhan Omar