Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said an ongoing federal investigation into Rep. Ilhan Omar's marital history could ultimately result in her deportation, telling conservative commentator Benny Johnson that Omar married her brother as part of an alleged fraudulent immigration scheme. Mullin made the remarks at the Republican National Convention in Dallas, asserting that the case is still being investigated and that if authorities move forward, it would be an actual case rather than a political one.
As reported by the New York Post, Mullin said authorities could deport a person if they prove that person lied on an application and should not have been admitted to the United States. He said the investigation may involve family migration and illegal activity connected to entry into the country, and he noted that Omar's ex-husband now lives in London. Omar, a Somali-born Democratic representative from Minnesota, has denied marrying her brother.
A Rumor That Traces Back a Decade
The underlying allegation is not new. Claims that Omar married her biological brother first surfaced on the SomaliSpot online forum in 2016 before being amplified by the conservative blog Power Line during her initial campaign for the Minnesota House of Representatives, according to MPR News. Omar called the claims absurd and offensive at the time, and she went on to defeat a long-serving incumbent in that year's Democratic primary.
The marital history Mullin referenced does have a documented paper trail. Omar was legally married to British citizen Ahmed Nur Said Elmi from 2009 until their divorce was finalized in 2017, while she maintained a religious marriage with Ahmed Hirsi, whom she legally married in 2018 before divorcing in 2019 and marrying Tim Mynett in 2020, according to FOX 9 Minneapolis-St. Paul. Omar has said she separated religiously from Elmi in 2011 before pursuing a formal legal divorce.
State Finance Board Found Tax Issue, Not Fraud
In June 2019, the Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board ordered Omar to reimburse $3,500 to her campaign after finding she had used campaign funds for personal tax filing assistance. That inquiry revealed Omar filed joint tax returns with Hirsi in 2014 and 2015 while still legally married to Elmi, per the Associated Press. The state board's finding centered on improper use of political funds, not immigration fraud, and no state or federal court has ever established that Elmi was her brother or that the marriage constituted immigration fraud.
Why Deportation Is Not a Simple Step
Omar arrived in the United States as a 12-year-old refugee in 1995 after fleeing the Somali Civil War and spending four years in a Kenyan refugee camp, becoming a naturalized citizen in 2000 at age 17, according to her Wikipedia biography. Because she has been a naturalized citizen for more than two decades, federal law does not allow Homeland Security to deport her directly. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1451, the Department of Justice would first have to win a civil denaturalization suit in federal court on grounds of illegal procurement or willful misrepresentation, per the U.S. House Office of the Law Revision Counsel.
That legal path carries a heavy burden. The Supreme Court's 1943 ruling in Schneiderman v. United States, reaffirmed in later rulings, requires the federal government to present clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence before a naturalized citizen's status can be revoked, according to the U.S. Library of Congress Constitution Annotated. The Court also held in the 2017 case Maslenjak v. United States that any false statement must be proven material to the actual decision granting citizenship, meaning immaterial misstatements alone cannot support denaturalization, per Oyez.
Part of a Broader Enforcement Push
Mullin was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in a 54-45 vote in March 2026 to become the ninth Secretary of Homeland Security, moving into the role after serving as a U.S. Senator from Oklahoma and succeeding Kristi Noem. According to Hoodline, his remarks about Omar came amid a period of intensified immigration enforcement nationally, with ICE detentions hitting record highs of 49,571 in July and nearly 51,000 in August, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Omar has previously said federal immigration agents were monitoring her public events in Minnesota, and Hoodline has reported on an undercover Homeland Security Investigations agent she said was parked outside her Richfield town hall. She also spoke at a news conference in Minneapolis in January after a man sprayed her during a chaotic town hall appearance. For now, Mullin's comments remain an assertion tied to an investigation he says is ongoing, with no court filing or formal charge disclosed.
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