Calls to expel Muslims spark backlash as US officials invoke Bondi Beach attack

Social media lit up this week after Republican officials called for the expulsion of Muslims from the US after the Bondi Beach mass shooting over the weekend in Sydney, Australia​​​​​​, prompting backlash over what critics described as open, state-level Islamophobia.

Republican lawmakers - including Florida Congressman Randy Fine, Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville and Texas Congressman Keith Self - have invoked the mass shooting during a Hanukkah celebration to justify calls aimed at expelling Muslims from the United States.

“It is time for a Muslim travel ban, radical deportations of all mainstream Muslim legal and illegal immigrants, and citizenship revocations wherever possible. 

“Mainstream Muslims have declared war on us,” Congressman Fine posted on X the day after the attack. “The least we can do is kick them the hell out of America.”

Fine’s Islamophobic call echoes statements of Senator Tuberville from earlier this week, where he said that “Islam is not a religion” but a “cult”.

“Islamists aren't here to assimilate. They're here to conquer. Stop worrying about offending the pearl clutchers. We've got to SEND THEM HOME NOW or we'll become the United Caliphate of America,” he said in his X post. 

Congressman Self claimed in a post on X that a group of republican lawmakers have “critical pieces of legislation that could protect [the US] from the threat of Sharia”, which he says has already “taken over” France and the UK. 

Vicki Paladino, a New York City councilmember, also called for the expulsion of Muslims in a statement on X, which has since been deleted. Up to one million Muslims live in New York, making up nearly a quarter of all Muslims in the US. 

Elected officials across city and state governments quickly moved to condemn the Islamophobic rhetoric being used by right-wing conservatives, warning it escalates hate and risks real-world harm.

New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who is Muslim, responded directly to Paladino, writing in an X post: “We belong here, as does every other New Yorker. This is vile Islamophobia from the Councilwoman and it has no place in our city.”

New York Senator Chuck Schumer and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez both stated that the antisemitic attack in Australia over the weekend musn’t be used to fuel Islamophobia. 

“The normalization and acceptance of Islamophobia in our politics is disgusting,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote in a post. “Our Muslim neighbors are not Republicans’ scapegoats for antisemitic attacks and Trump’s failed policies.” 

New York City comptroller Brad Lander took it a step further, and suggested that the city council begin censure proceedings this week to reprimand Paladino for her statement. 

A Congressman says mainstream Muslims should be “destroyed.”

A Senator says Islam is not a religion and Muslims should be sent “home.”

A NYC Councilwoman calls for the “expulsion” and “denaturalization” of Muslims.

Fascist anti-Muslim bigotry is now explicit Republican policy. https://t.co/BhJIISXYwS

— Dylan Williams (@dylanotes) December 15, 2025

More than just condemnation

A number of officials and commentators echoed Lander’s sentiment and argued that the Islamophobic rhetoric demanded more than statements of condemnation. 

“Why in the hell is this man not being immediately removed from committees and a floor vote for his removal?” New York Congress candidate Michael Blake posted on X. 

Another candidate for congress, Oliver Larkin in Florida, put it simply: “Fine should be expelled.”

Others pointed to how casually Fine and Tuberville suggested denaturalising Muslim Americans, arguing it reflects the normalisation of Islamophobia in American society.

“What makes the hatred of Muslims quite unique in America at this moment is the extent to which it is repeatedly and overtly professed at the highest levels of American government, making clear that it is a racism that is normalized above all others,” academic Yousef Munayyer posted on X. 

National legal director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Jenin Younes, drew parallels between the Islamophobic calls and past episodes of mass discrimination, warning that the rhetoric echoes some of history’s darkest moments.

“This is a sitting US senator talking about four or five million Americans and 1.6 billion people worldwide,” she posted on X, arguing it mirrors early Nazi language before “sending them home” gave way to mass violence.

It’s unwise to respond to every dumb ass bigoted thing people say on the internet, but when a United States Senator — albeit the dumbest United States Senator — calls for denaturalization & deportation of an entire religion, you have to call it out as the evil it is. pic.twitter.com/UaZyX8GhUE

— Senator Scott Wiener (@Scott_Wiener) December 16, 2025

One social media user noted that while there has been a wave of condemnation and calls for reprimands, there have been no demands for formal consequences like those previously imposed on Palestinian-American Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib.

An X post singled out Congressman Dan Goldman, who previously defended his vote to censure Tlaib, arguing that by his own stated standard - opposing discriminatory hate speech against any group - Fine’s rhetoric would qualify. “Yet there is no censure effort, no resolution, no follow-through,” the social media user added, calling the response “symbolic outrage” rather than real accountability.

“This confirms what we’ve been saying for the past two years. There is a hierarchy in how speech is policed in Congress. A certain ethnic and religious group is protected institutionally, while Muslims and Palestinians are expected to absorb dehumanization with nothing more than symbolic condemnation in response.”