DHS secretary says Omar probe is live, deportation possible if fraud is proved

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told conservative host Benny Johnson on Thursday that the federal government is investigating Rep. Ilhan Omar’s immigration history and that deportation is on the table if investigators prove she obtained status by lying.

The remarks came on the floor of the Republican midterm convention. Johnson asked about long-running claims that Omar married her brother so he could stay in the United States.

“Something’s going to happen,” Mullin said. “This is an ongoing investigation.” Then: “We know that she married her brother to try to bring him into the United States. We know he lives now in London.” He added that investigators are looking at “the whole family migration and possibly some illegal activity for them to come to the United States to begin with.”

Mullin insisted any case would have to rest on evidence. “If we actually move a case forward, it’s not a political case, it’s an actual case, because they did things wrong.” On the legal theory: “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.”

A DHS spokesman later told Newsweek the department does not discuss specific techniques or open cases and that “no one, including members of Congress, are above the law.” Mullin announced no indictment, no denaturalization filing, and no removal order.

The marriage claim is not new. It surfaced in 2016 on the Somali discussion board SomaliSpot as Omar ran for the Minnesota House, then moved onto the conservative Powerline blog and later Alpha News. David Steinberg’s Powerline work alleged sibling marriage and family asylum irregularities. The Daily Mail published community accounts, including Minneapolis Somali blogger Abdihakim Osman, who said Omar introduced Ahmed Nur Said Elmi in the late 2000s as her brother from London who needed “papers.” A deleted Instagram caption reportedly called Omar’s infant Elmi’s “niece.” A Hennepin County certificate shows Omar legally married Elmi on Feb. 12, 2009.Omar has denied the sibling claim for a decade. In 2016 she told MPR the insinuation was “absurd and offensive.” She said she applied for a license with Ahmed Hirsi in 2002 but never completed a civil marriage; they later split in their faith tradition; she legally married British citizen Elmi in 2009; that relationship ended; she later reconciled with Hirsi. She told the Star Tribune in 2018 it was “really strange … to prove a negative” and that she does not have a brother by Elmi’s name. The Star Tribune wrote it “could neither conclusively confirm nor rebut” that Elmi is her sibling. Snopes has called the brother claim unfounded. No court has ruled on it.

President Trump has repeated the allegation, including at a December 2025 rally: “She married her brother in order to get in [the US], right? We ought to get her the hell out.” In March, Vice President JD Vance told Johnson, “We actually think that Ilhan Omar definitely committed immigration fraud,” and said he had discussed “remedies” with Stephen Miller. Border czar Tom Homan later told Johnson the file was under review: “Stay tuned.”

Omar became a naturalized citizen in 2000 at 17. Removing a citizen requires a denaturalization case first. That is the fight Mullin described.