Minneapolis woman who Ilhan Omar took to State of the Union needed medical care after arrest
#State of the Union#Capitol Police arrest#Aliyah Rahman#Ilhan Omar#Civil disobedience#DHS funding#Immigration crackdown
📌 Key Takeaways
Rahman was arrested for standing silently during Trump's DHS funding remarks
She has pre-existing shoulder injuries and required hospital care after aggressive arrest
Omar criticized the 'heavy-handed response' to her peaceful protest
Capitol Police claimed she violated rules against demonstrating at the event
📖 Full Retelling
Aliyah Rahman, a Minneapolis woman attending the State of Union address as guest of Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., was arrested and required hospital treatment after standing silently during President Donald Trump's speech in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, when Capitol Police claimed she was disrupting Congress by refusing to sit down. Rahman stood up during the portion of Trump's speech in which he called on Democrats to restore funding for the Department of Homeland Security, remaining seated while those around her stood during ovations. Despite explaining her need to stand due to a torn rotator cuff and multiple cartilage tears in both shoulders, and using a crutch for mobility, Capitol Police forcibly removed her from the gallery. The physical handling was so aggressive that other attendees protested, with one guest calling on officers to be less forceful with Rahman, who was taken to George Washington University Hospital for treatment before being booked at Capitol Police headquarters. Omar condemned the arrest as a 'heavy-handed response to a peaceful guest' that sends 'a chilling message about the state of our democracy,' while Rahman herself stated she was simply exercising her right to stand, which she noted is one of only two permitted actions at the State of the Union, alongside sitting down.
🏷️ Themes
Civil liberties, Political protest, Immigration enforcement
Annual report by the president of the United States
The State of the Union address (sometimes abbreviated to SOTU) is an annual message delivered by the president of the United States to a joint session of the United States Congress near the beginning of most calendar years on the current condition of the nation. The speech generally includes reports...
Ilhan Abdullahi Omar (born October 4, 1982) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for Minnesota's 5th congressional district since 2019. She is a member of the Democratic Party. Before her election to Congress, Omar served in the Minnesota House of Representatives from 2017 t...
Civil disobedience is the active and professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders, or commands of a government (or any other authority). By some definitions, civil disobedience has to be nonviolent to be called "civil". Hence, civil disobedience is sometimes equated with peac...
Minneapolis woman who Ilhan Omar took to State of the Union needed medical care after arrest Omar said Capitol Police "aggressively handled" her guest, Aliyah Rahman of Minneapolis, forcing her to seek medical care at a hospital. U.S. Capitol Police arrested Aliyah Rahman after she stood and refused to sit down during President Donald Trump's State of the Union address. Rahman was Rep. Ilhan Omar’s guest at the event Tuesday. Frank Thorp V / NBC News Share Add NBC News to Google Feb. 25, 2026, 11:45 PM EST By Frank Thorp V , Inshara Ali and Raquel Coronell Uribe Listen to this article with a free account 00:00 00:00 WASHINGTON — Aliyah Rahman, a Minnesota woman whom Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., took as her guest to the State of the Union address Tuesday, needed hospital treatment after she was arrested during the speech, Rahman and Omar said. Rahman silently stood up during the part of President Donald Trump’s speech in which he called on Democrats to restore funding for the Department of Homeland Security. The people around her remained seated. When U.S. Capitol Police approached and asked Rahman to sit down, she refused. During her conversation with Capitol Police officers, the crowd around her gave a standing ovation, which Rahman tried to explain to the officers was a reason she should not be forced to leave. Capitol Police took Rahman, who was walking with the help of a crutch, and started pulling her toward the exit — a move that faced protest from one of the other guests in the gallery, who called on the police to be less aggressive with Rahman. Rahman said in an interview with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! that she was in the custody of Capitol Police and then in the hospital until just before 4 a.m. “I was not just removed and arrested. I was arrested so physically that two other attendees upstairs attempted to intervene in officers pulling on my shoulders after I told them I have a torn rotator cuff tendon and multiple cartilage tears in both of my shoulders,...
