No ‘Special’ Treatment For Ilhan Omar as Investigators Question Her Age

The Department of Homeland Security would need clear evidence of probable cause that a crime may have been committed to convince a judge to sign off on a search warrant of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s home, according to a legal expert.Federal agents from the Department of Homeland Security searched Ms. Omar’s Washington, D.C.-area home before dawn on Monday morning in connection with a criminal investigation for alleged immigration fraud. After spending hours in the Minnesota congresswoman’s home, agents were seen leaving with boxes. Heritage Foundation Legal Fellow Cully Stimson, a former military judge, says a judge would have treaded carefully in approving the search due to the sensitive nature of the case. “There’s no sort of extra high bar for special people like Congress people, but anyone with a brain knows that if you’re a magistrate judge, you’re going to make sure every “i” is dotted and “t” is crossed if you’re going to sign and authorize a warrant,” Mr. Stimson told the Sun.The Justice Department did not offer specifics about what the investigation entailed. “Today in the Washington, D.C. area, Homeland Security Investigations executed a judicially authorized search warrant secured by the Department of Justice. This enforcement action is part of an ongoing federal criminal investigation,” the Justice Department said in a Monday morning statement.While federal authorities remained tight lipped on the probe, it appears to involve questions about whether Ms. Omar lied about her age to become a citizen. The search warrant reportedly lists a series of potential immigration crimes, including false statements and fraud in immigration paperwork, and a conspiracy charge, the New York Times reported.Ms. Omar moved from Somalia to America with her father in 1995 and became a citizen in 2000. Ms. Omar said she was 17 at the time and received automatic citizenship when her father became a naturalized citizen, but there have long been claims that she was actually 18 at the time and would not have received automatic citizenship. Ms. Omar has said she does not have a birth certificate from war-torn Somalia.The statute of limitations is believed to have passed, blocking prosecution for any false claims involving her citizenship documents, but if Ms. Omar had continued to use a fake birthday on other documents like passport renewals it may reopen the possibility of prosecution. “I think the judge was satisfied that whatever crime or crimes were, they’re investigating, the statute hasn’t run,” Mr. Stimson said.While the search indicates that the investigation is far into the process, the results of the search could lead to new action. “It may result in wiretaps. Maybe there’s already a wiretap where they’re tapping her phones or somebody else’s phones based on information they got from the house or other information they got before they even got the search warrant,” Mr. Stimson said.Since being elected to Congress in 2018 as the first Somali-American and one of the first two Muslim women to serve in the House, many conservatives have pushed for investigations into Ms. Omar and her family, including the allegation that she married her brother — an accusation she has long denied.President Trump has made Ms. Omar one of his favorite targets. During an Ohio campaign rally hours after the raid, Mr. Trump continued his attacks. “She’s a disaster, she comes from a country without laws, without police, without military, where all they do is shoot each other,” Mr. Trump said. The crowd responded with chants of “deport her.”Ms. Omar says the search is part of a political retribution campaign. “This raid by Trump’s DHS is an outrageous abuse of power and an unprecedented escalation in the weaponization of federal law enforcement to target political enemies,” Ms. Omar’s office said in a statement. “For a decade, Donald Trump has relentlessly targeted Congresswoman Ilhan Omar with inflammatory rhetoric, repeatedly putting a target on her back. Now, those attacks have escalated to a pointless federal raid,” the statement continued.Vice President JD Vance says the investigation is simply following the facts. “There are some serious allegations against Ilhan Omar. We’re going to look into those. Again, if there’s a real case there, we’re going to follow the facts. If there’s not a real case there, then we won’t,” Mr. Vance told reporters Tuesday morning at Joint Base Andrews as he prepared to depart for a Texas campaign rally.If the investigation does lead to an indictment, it is far from certain it would lead to a conviction because there is a big difference between probable cause and proving beyond a reasonable doubt that a crime was committed. “So just because you can get probable cause to get a search warrant doesn’t mean you can get beyond a reasonable doubt,” Mr. Stimson said.Ms. Omar also has a powerful tool she could possibly use to block the government’s case — the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause — that give lawmakers a shield from arrest as they carry out legislative activity.“We’ll see how this develops, but hopefully the facts will drive the decisions and nothing more,” Mr. Stimson added.

No ‘Special’ Treatment For Ilhan Omar as Investigators Question Her Age

No ‘Special’ Treatment For Ilhan Omar as Investigators Question Her Age

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