Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Thursday that federal authorities are actively investigating longstanding allegations that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) married her brother as part of an immigration scheme, reviving a claim that has followed the Minneapolis congresswoman since at least 2016.
Mullin made the comments during an interview with podcaster Benny Johnson at the GOP midterm convention in Dallas. He said the allegation centers on Omar’s 2009 marriage to Ahmed Nur Said Elmi.
“We know that she married her brother to try to bring him to the United States,” Mullin said.
Mullin said Elmi now lives in London and that investigators may be examining broader questions about how Omar’s family came to the United States.
Investigators may be looking at “the whole family migration and possibly some illegal activity for them to come to the United States to begin with,” he said.
Mullin argued the matter is being treated as a legal question rather than a political one.
“Here’s what I want to make sure we do: if we actually move a case forward, it’s not a political case, it’s an actual case, because they did things wrong,” Mullin said. “If you lied about certain things about your application. There’s no expiration to that. If we can prove it – that you shouldn’t have been here in the first place – we’ll deport you.”
The Minneapolis Star Tribune examined the marriage allegations in a 2019 report, revisiting documents and unresolved questions about Omar’s marital history, including claims that she had wed a relative to sidestep immigration law. Omar has denied those claims.
President Trump has raised the same allegation publicly, including in an interview with Politico late last year, in which he argued the United States should prioritize immigrants who contribute to the country.
“Yeah, I want to see people that contribute. I don’t want to see Somalia. I don’t want to see a woman that, you know, marries her brother to get in and then becomes a congressman and does nothing but complain,” Trump said. “Let her go back, fix up her own country.”
Omar has repeatedly and forcefully denied the allegation, calling the claim that Elmi is her brother “absurd and offensive.”
In May, Omar told Fox News that Vice President JD Vance’s assertion of a Justice Department investigation into her immigration history and alleged fraud was untrue.
“That is not something that is happening,” Omar said. “That man is delusional.”
Marriage fraud is a federal felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
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