Trump Administration Is Building Case to Denaturalize and Deport Ilhan Omar, Report Says
The Wall Street Journal reports that investigators are examining whether Omar or her late father misrepresented her age on citizenship paperwork in 2000. Federal agents seized her passport, phone and computers in a Monday raid, and more than a dozen subpoenas have gone out.
The Trump administration is building a case that could lead to the denaturalization and deportation of Rep. Ilhan Omar, the Minnesota Democrat, according to a Wall Street Journal report published Wednesday that cites U.S. officials and people familiar with the investigation.
Federal agents searched Omar’s Washington, D.C., home on Monday and seized her cellphone, notebooks, personal computers and her passport, the Journal reported. Omar, 44, and her husband, Tim Mynett, were home when agents executed the search warrant.
The case centers on how Omar became a U.S. citizen in 2000. She has long said she was 17 when her father, Nur Omar Mohamed, was naturalized, which would have made her a citizen automatically through him. Investigators are looking for evidence that this claim is false. The report says officials are examining whether Omar or her father listed her as 17 rather than 18 on citizenship paperwork. Some records give her birthdate as Oct. 4, 1981; others give the same date in 1982. If she was 18 when her father was naturalized, she would have needed to go through the citizenship process herself.
The Journal also reports that investigators were tipped off about the potential age discrepancy during the Biden administration but did not move forward because of a lack of evidence.
More than a dozen grand jury subpoenas have been issued, including to Omar’s relatives. The New York Times reported that Omar’s sister, Sahra Noor, was among those subpoenaed. Prosecutors are reviewing the family’s immigration paperwork, and the Minnesota U.S. attorney’s office is leading the probe, the New York Post confirmed. In Washington, the office of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro is pursuing a separate inquiry into Omar and Mynett’s finances, following Pirro’s statement earlier Thursday that several investigations are underway.
The legal route
Criminal charges would face a time limit: according to federal defense attorney Todd Spodek, prosecutors could only bring an immigration-fraud case within 10 years of the alleged act, or within five years for false statements. Civil denaturalization has no similar statute of limitations. The Post reports that the Justice Department has filed nearly 200 civil denaturalization cases since the president’s second term began in January 2025, though only 20 have ended with defendants placed in deportation proceedings, according to an analysis by the group Democracy Forward. A sitting member of Congress has never been denaturalized.
Omar denies wrongdoing
Omar has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. In a statement to the Journal this week, her office said: “President Trump would love to eliminate one of the most effective progressive voices in Congress. There is no basis for this.”
She has also described the investigation as political. “Make no mistake: this is an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement,” she said this week. “For ten years, Trump has targeted me with baseless lies and smear campaigns. This is just the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation.”
Trump told reporters Monday that he had “nothing to do” with the investigation, while calling Omar a “totally crooked” politician.
Reporting based on coverage by the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and the Washington Examiner.
