00:06Being an immigrant is not a dirty word. It's not something to feel bad about or to be shamed
00:13for or to be ostracized and outed for. It is to be American. To be immigrant is to be American.
00:22Any immigrant to America is making it more statist, less free. If you listen to the cable
00:28news, you would think this is our biggest threat. If more people had concealed carry
00:34permits, then we could end those Muslims before they go out there and kill us. Heated political
00:40talk says Muslims are terrorists ruining our country. Donald J. Trump is calling for a total
00:46and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States. This is the story of a Somali
00:53immigrant who could make history.
01:00I made the decision to run for office because I knew that we needed a different
01:06voice representing us. We created a beautiful winning coalition of young people, of progressives,
01:14of new immigrants. We won our primary on August 9th with the highest number of votes anyone has
01:22ever won in this district. It was sort of like moving a mountain. We did it successfully
01:28only because everyone believed in the vision that we had for them.
01:32Time for Ilhan. Time for Ilhan. Time for Ilhan.
01:38Ilhan Omar will likely become the first ever Somali American elected to a legislature
01:45in the United States.
01:46I value the resources in our community. I value all of you. And this is why so many of you
01:53came
01:53here today. Because you all need someone to value your voice. And I pledge you that.
02:03There is a beauty and uniqueness in living in one of the most diverse districts in the country.
02:09There is a huge diversity in class and socioeconomics. What is the responsibility to people in upper
02:16middle class society? To those that are their neighbors who are struggling? These are the kind
02:23of conversations I'm looking forward to having in a unified district that sees themselves as one.
02:29We're really excited to have Ilhan here. She is on track to be the first Somali American
02:34woman elected for Minnesota House. That ability to create connections with people who don't look
02:42like me, who don't share my identities has sort of been the success of my campaign.
02:50Somalia was my foundation. I think it gives me a real perspective on what my identity is.
02:58When I was eight, the country ended up having a civil war. We ended up in a refugee camp in
03:05Mombasa.
03:06To be a refugee means to be in between, to be internally and externally homeless.
03:14The refugee camp was sort of where I developed my resilience and really understood how much I'm
03:22able to survive. America represents a new beginning. This is the place where I get to
03:30understand who I am, what, what my purpose is and live out that purpose.
03:39So he's like the official mayor of Little Muqaddisho, Cedar Riverside. He'll give us a little tour.
03:45I'll give you a little tour. I've been doing this tour for the past 16 years.
03:49I call it out of East Africa.
04:00How are you? Good to see you. How are you?
04:06This is my favorite spot in the neighborhood. A bar and a mosque. That's the beauty of our neighborhood.
04:10And that was the beauty of our campaign, right?
04:12Yes, exactly. Our office was here. People of all walks of life, of different races,
04:18of different ethnicities, of different ages coming together.
04:22One lady who's 71 years old told me this is what America looks like. That's what she found.
04:33The American dream is to be able to start from nothing
04:38and have a future that could be built with lots of promises if you work hard to know.
04:45The reality is this American exceptionalism, this beautiful dream that is sold to us,
04:52it's not really available to everyone. That we all must work hard for people who are living
04:58in the margins of society, people who are not in that envisioned dream for Americans.
05:05My dream is to make sure that all of us can one day live in America where that American dream
05:14is actually possible.
