Rep. Ilhan Omar's attorneys demand return of property seized in federal
search of her home
[October 17, 2026]
By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER
WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorneys for Rep. Ilhan Omar asked the Justice
Department on Friday to immediately return property that federal agents
seized from her home this week, arguing that the search stemming from an
immigration fraud investigation was “neither justified nor lawful.”
In a letter obtained by The Associated Press, lawyers for the Democrat
from Minnesota described the investigation as a baseless effort to go
after a longtime political target of Republican President Donald Trump,
noting that the search was conducted just weeks before the midterm
elections, in which Omar is on the ballot.
Omar's attorneys wrote that there is "no legitimate basis for any
suggestion that she has violated any law concerning her citizenship
status."
“This vindictive, retributive, and politically motivated criminal
investigation into one of the President’s chief congressional critics
violates Representative Omar’s constitutional rights and threatens the
separation of powers," Omar's legal team wrote in the letter first
reported by The Wall Street Journal.
A Justice Department spokesperson said the letter from Omar's defense
team was “riddled with false allegations and inaccuracies.”
“Our attorneys and law enforcement partners complied with all court
orders and legal obligations, as they always do,” department
spokesperson Emily Covington wrote in a text message Friday evening.
Monday's search of Omar's Washington, D.C., home this week drew swift
condemnation from Democrats, as the Justice Department has historically
sought to avoid public investigative actions involving a candidate
within 60 days of a primary or general election.
Federal authorities seized Omar's phone in the search and have issued
more than a dozen grand jury subpoenas, including to some of her
relatives, a person briefed on the probe told the AP this week.
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The scope of the investigation into Omar is unclear, though Homeland
Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has suggested that authorities
were examining potential crimes related to her family’s immigration
paperwork. Separately, Washington's U.S Attorney Jeanine Pirro has
said “there are several investigations going on” related to Omar and
her office is probing issues concerning the lawmaker’s financial
disclosures.
In the letter, Omar's attorneys accused the Justice Department of
violating longstanding agency policy designed to avoid potentially
influencing an election. They also raised concerns about whether the
department appropriately followed all of the specific instructions
by the magistrate judge who approved the search.
In addition to the return of her property, Omar's attorneys are
demanding that the Justice Department preserve any audio and video
that was taken during the search, according to the letter.
Omar has repeatedly refuted allegations about her marriage and
immigration status raised by conservative critics, even before she
joined Congress.
According to her House biography, Omar has said she and her family
fled Somalia’s civil war when she was 8: “The family spent four
years in a refugee camp in Kenya before coming to the United States
in 1990s. In 1997, she moved to Minneapolis with her family.” She
became a lawfully naturalized U.S. citizen in 2000, according to her
lawyers.
Conservative online sites have alleged that Omar married a brother
to commit immigration fraud. Omar has broadly denied the allegations
as “disgusting lies” and called the insinuation “absurd and
offensive.”
The search of her home came just days after Trump referred
pejoratively to Omar at a rally in Tennessee as coming from a
country of “crime and squalor” and suggested that Vice President JD
Vance “and our people” were investigating her. Hours after the
search, Trump told reporters he had “nothing to do” with it and it’s
“really up to the DOJ.”
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