ALSO SEE: Man Sprays Unknown Substance on Rep. Ilhan Omar and Is Tackled at Minneapolis Town Hall

In a video from the event, a man walks up and sprays what appears to be a liquid at the Minnesota Democrat — who is a frequent target of Trump — before he is taken away by security.

A man attacked Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota) while she was speaking during a Tuesday town hall meeting in Minneapolis, according to local police. The man used a syringe to spray an unknown liquid at Omar, police said.

The meeting was being held in the wake of the fatal shooting of ICU nurse Alex Pretti by federal officers last week, amid President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown on Minnesota that has roiled the state.

Just before she was attacked, Omar called for abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and for Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem, who oversees that federal agency, to resign or face impeachment.

A live stream of the event showed the man being tackled to the ground and taken away by security. A suspect was immediately arrested and booked into Hennepin County Jail on suspicion of third-degree assault, police said. The Minneapolis Police Department later identified the arrested suspect as 55-year-old Anthony Kazmierczak.

Photos from the scene show the syringe contained a brown liquid. Omar appeared unharmed and continued speaking afterward.

“We are Minnesota strong. We will stay resilient in the face of whatever they might throw at us,” she said after coming back to the lectern.

In a social media post after the attack, Omar said she was all right and thanked her constituents for rallying behind her.

“I’m a survivor so this small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work,” she wrote on X.

Trump has, in recent months, used racist and dehumanizing rhetoric to attack Somali migrants, often singling out Omar, the first Somali and one of the first Muslim women to be elected to Congress. Earlier Tuesday, Trump had again publicly assailed Omar at an event in Iowa.

“She comes from a country that’s a disaster. Probably it’s considered, I think, the worst — it’s not even a country, okay? It barely has a government,” he said then, referring to Somalia.

In a phone interview late Tuesday, Trump minimized reports of the town hall incident and called Omar a “fraud,” echoing his frequent barbs against the congresswoman. Trump told ABC News that Omar “probably had herself sprayed, knowing her,” without providing evidence to substantiate the claim.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Trump’s assertion that Omar had staged her attack was “disgusting” and said he was thankful Omar was okay.

“The president’s lies and misinformation continue to fan the flames of these type of violent incidents. And it’s at a moment like this, where we actually need leadership from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and it is something that we never get from this president. Ilhan Omar, of course, is a strong, courageous, hardworking public servant. This should have never happened.”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) called the attack on Omar “unacceptable.”

“Violence and intimidation have no place in Minneapolis. We can disagree without putting people at risk,” he said in a tweet.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-South Carolina) said she was “deeply disturbed” by the attack on Omar. “Regardless of how vehemently I disagree with her rhetoric — and I do — no elected official should face physical attacks,” she wrote on X.

Other Democrats criticized the White House and Trump for their frequent attacks on Omar.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said on X: “The cruel, inflammatory, dehumanizing rhetoric by our nation’s leaders needs to stop immediately.” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) said on X that it “was not a coincidence” for Omar to get assaulted after facing “slanderous public attacks” from Trump and Vice President JD Vance.

Trump has recently ramped up his attacks against Somali migrants in part because of reports of extensive fraud in Minnesota’s social services system, in which dozens of Somali individuals are accused of stealing millions in government funds over the past five years. Omar has not been implicated in the scandal.

Trump ended a Cabinet meeting last month with a rant against Somali migrants, calling them “garbage” and saying he did not want them in the United States. Weeks before, he had threatened to end temporary protected status for Somali immigrants in Minnesota and, without evidence, accused “Somali gangs” of terrorizing people there.

Last week, Trump insulted Somali migrants in his remarks at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

“Can you believe that? Somalia — they turned out to be higher-IQ than we thought,” Trump told the audience of political and corporate leaders from around the globe. “I always say these are low-IQ people. How do they go into Minnesota and steal all that money?”

Trump has also criticized Omar, who fled civil war in Somalia and later immigrated to the United States, for complaining about her adopted country too much.

The town hall incident came the same day that the U.S. Capitol Police said threats against lawmakers were on the rise. In a report Tuesday, the agency said its threat assessment section investigated around 15,000 “concerning statements, behaviors, and communications directed against Members of Congress, their families, staff, and the Capitol Complex” last year, up from around 9,500 in 2024. The police said that curbing calls for physical harm in political discourse would help reduce the number of threats.