I met up with the Federalist’s Ben Weingarten in Minneapolis this past fall when he was in the process of finishing American Ingrate: Ilhan Omar and the Progressive Islamist Takeover of the Democratic Party. With a foreword by Andrew McCarthy, the book is published in paperback today by Bombardier Books; it is available on Amazon at the link.

Ben sent me and a few other students of Omar a copy of the book in galley last month. At my request, Ben forwarded the blurbs his early readers offered to recommend the book. With Ben’s permission, I am posting them below in lieu of a formal review of the book this morning:

Victor Davis Hanson: “Benjamin Weingarten professionally and thoroughly dissects the strange case of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and demonstrates that much about the congresswoman is an enigma at best and a fraud at worst. We do not know, and authorities are apparently not interested in, her strange marriage…her tax avoidance, her violations of campaign financing laws, and her apparent disgust with a country that she…sought out and presently finds profitable. Weingarten’s case study of Omar serves as a larger indictment of the therapeutic mindset, which Omar manipulated so well on her way to notoriety and power. Weingarten suggests that if Omar had not existed, she would have had to be invented, given that she is a metaphor for a larger American pathology of progressive virtue-signaling and, ultimately, self-loathing.” – Victor Davis Hanson, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Dennis Prager: “American Ingrate is a serious, deeply researched work that makes the compelling case Rep. Ilhan Omar is the new face of the Democratic Party, and delves deeply into her background and beliefs. It compellingly sets forth the argument that she not only personifies but leads a Progressive-Islamist alliance held together by the glue of hatred of America, of Judeo-Christian values, of Western civilization, and of Israel. Read it and weep. Or better, read it and fight back. This is a manual in that fight.” – Dennis Prager, nationally radio talk show host and columnist, co-founder of PragerU, and New York Times bestselling author of ten books, including, most recently, the first two volumes of The Rational Bible, a five-volume commentary on the Torah

Newt Gingrich: “It has become clear that left-wing ideology and extreme identity politics have cultivated a dangerous strain of anti-Semitism in the Democratic Party that is part and parcel of its increasingly anti-Judeo Christian and anti-Western orientation. Benjamin Weingarten has done a brilliant job of illustrating this phenomenon through the story of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s rise to power despite her holding views about Israel, the Jewish people, and America’s role in the world which would have been unacceptable just a few years ago. American Ingrate is required reading for anyone seeking to understand the modern Democratic Party’s posture towards Israel and its reflexive anti-Americanism.” – Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House

Scott Johnson: “Since she first emerged as a public figure in Minneapolis, Ilhan Omar has been accorded coverage fit for an old-fashioned fan magazine like Tiger Beat. The mainstream media have turned away from any serious examination of Omar’s shocking personal background or her foggy Islamist Marxism as though she were just any other prominent Democrat. Ben Weingarten pierces the fog in his penetrating study of Omar. In my own writing I have followed Omar closely from the moment she appeared on the scene as a conquering hero of the left in August 2016, yet I learned new things about her on virtually every page of American Ingrate. Omar is a leading indicator of the direction of the Democratic Party. This is therefore both an impressive and important book.” – Scott Johnson, Power Line

Lee Smith: “American Ingrate is a sharply critical reckoning—cultural, political, and intellectual—with Ilhan Omar, one of the most divisive and destructive figures in American public life. The Democratic party’s inability, or unwillingness, to censure or even criticize the Minnesota congresswoman for her hateful remarks about other Americans, American Jews, is evidence that one of the country’s two major political parties is trending in a dangerous direction—not progressivism but Middle East-style sectarianism. Benjamin Weingarten has the full story. His comprehensive research, unearthing Ms. Omar’s hidden past and unpacking her third-worldist ideological convictions, is an invaluable and timely contribution to the key debates shaping our American moment.” – Lee Smith, investigative journalist and author of The Plot Against the President

Caroline Glick: “Ilhan Omar, the subject of Benjamin Weingarten’s timely and copiously researched book, shares Jeremy Corbyn’s Communism, and his hatred of Jews and Israel and support for Islamic terrorists in the United States and terrorists worldwide. And as Weingarten demonstrates, she also hates the United States of America. While she doesn’t hold a formal leadership role in the Democratic party…[s]he is playing a central role in Corbynizing the Democratic Party. Weingarten’s book sounds a critical warning bell. Ilhan Omar is no mere ‘symbol’ of diversity. She is a hardcore, radical, ideologue who went into politics to advance her goal of weakening America while making the United States an inhospitable place for Jews and for everyone who doesn’t share her bigoted hatred for Americans, America, and everything it stands for.” – Caroline Glick, award-winning columnist and author of The Israeli Solution: A One State Plan for Peace in the Middle East