Derrick Van Orden Racist Wisconsin

Derrick Van Orden Called Islam 'a Violent Religion.' Asked Whether That Includes the Muslims He Represents, He Wouldn't Answer.

A Wisconsin Muslim group condemned Rep. Derrick Van Orden's remarks on a radio show. Instead of walking them back, he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that Islam 'is a violent religion' — and dodged when asked about his own Muslim constituents.

MAGA Report Cards · Sep 13, 2026

Derrick Van Orden Called Islam 'a Violent Religion.' Asked Whether That Includes the Muslims He Represents, He Wouldn't Answer.

Derrick Van Orden represents every person in western Wisconsin's 3rd District, including the Muslims who live there. This month he went on the radio and made sweeping claims about their religion. When a Muslim civic group objected, he didn't apologize. He went further.

What he said on the radio

On September 1, Van Orden was a guest on Vicki McKenna's radio show. McKenna brought up New York Gov. Kathy Hochul wearing a hijab, and Muslim Democrats like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed.

Van Orden said Hochul was "kowtowing to Muslim men because that's what that culture's all about."

He also said, according to the Milwaukee Courier's account of the broadcast:

"The value system of Islam does not comport with modern Western thought."

And he said Scandinavia wasn't conquered by Islam because "they didn't have airplanes, and they didn't have something called suicidal empathy."

The Wisconsin Muslim Civic Alliance said Van Orden "made sweeping and bigoted generalizations about Muslims and Islam." It said his words were "the same rhetoric that has long been used to paint 1.8 billion Muslims worldwide, including tens of thousands of Wisconsinites, as fundamentally incompatible with American life."

Then he doubled down

Days later, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel asked Van Orden about the backlash. He stood by it, and then some.

Islam, he said, "when practiced as written, is a violent religion that calls for the murder of anyone that leaves Islam, for instance."

He added:

"I've studied Islam. I've probably studied Islam more than these folks. And I understand what that religion has led to. It has led to the murder of tens, if not hundreds, of millions of people throughout the ages."

"These folks" are a civic group of Muslims in his own state.

Van Orden told stories from his time as a Navy SEAL in Afghanistan to explain his view. Afghanistan is run by the Taliban, which follows a strict, hardline reading of Islamic law. It is the only country in the world that bars girls from school past sixth grade.

The question he wouldn't answer

So the Journal Sentinel asked him the obvious question. Does he see the Muslim Americans in his district as separate from what the Taliban does in Afghanistan?

He didn't answer.

He also didn't answer whether he believes his Muslim constituents' practice of their faith fits with modern Western culture. He replied that he was talking about the religion itself.

That dodge is the whole problem. Van Orden is not a radio host. He is a member of Congress, and his job is to represent everyone in his district, whatever their faith. He was given a clean chance to say that Muslims in western Wisconsin are his constituents like anyone else, and that his words were about the Taliban, not them. He wouldn't say it.

The alliance has asked him to retract the comments and to meet with Muslim constituents in his district "before making further public statements about our community."

This isn't new for him

The same group has called on Van Orden to apologize before. In June, the Milwaukee Courier documented a pattern of anti-Muslim and racist comments on his social media, and we wrote about that record in July.

He's also part of a bigger push. Republicans have spent heavily turning "Sharia" into a campaign scare word this year. We tracked that $10 million effort and what happened when Michigan nominated a Muslim for Senate anyway.

Van Orden faces Democrat Rebecca Cooke in November, in a hotly contested race.

The bottom line

On a September 1 radio show, Derrick Van Orden said the governor of New York was "kowtowing to Muslim men because that's what that culture's all about." After a Wisconsin Muslim group condemned it, he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that Islam "is a violent religion." Asked whether he sees the Muslims in his own district differently, he would not answer.