Mullin Says Agents Served Several Warrants on the Day They Searched Ilhan Omar's Home
The DHS secretary called the immigration-fraud probe a "strong case" headed for a grand jury; Omar, who has not been charged, says it is political.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Friday that federal agents served multiple search warrants on the same day they searched Rep. Ilhan Omar's home in Washington, D.C., and called the investigation a "strong case" that he expects to go before a grand jury.
Mullin made the remarks in an interview with Andrew Kolvet, host of the "Charlie Kirk Show" podcast. He said the other warrants were served on Monday, that a judge authorized the enforcement action, and that the Justice Department and President Trump would not have gone ahead without assurance that the case was not politically driven. Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, has not been charged with a crime.
The investigation is being run by Homeland Security Investigations, part of DHS, working with the Justice Department. It concerns possible fraud involving immigration documents that Omar's family submitted decades ago. Sources told CBS News the paperwork dates to Omar's childhood and was completed by her late father. Several relatives have received grand jury subpoenas, the sources said, and DHS took Omar's personal cellphone.
Mullin also raised the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, known as RICO. He used a hypothetical about a former foreign warlord who entered the United States as a refugee with his daughter, arguing that filing fraudulent immigration paperwork and helping others enter under the same scheme could be prosecuted under the law. He did not say the hypothetical applied to Omar's family and did not explicitly say RICO charges were being pursued against her. He suggested such a case could reach conduct from decades ago and that statutes of limitations would generally not bar it.
The law is more complicated. Criminal RICO prosecutions generally carry a five-year statute of limitations, though prosecutors can include older acts in a timely case that alleges an ongoing enterprise or conspiracy. In its 1957 decision in Grunewald v. United States, the Supreme Court held that prosecutors cannot stretch a conspiracy indefinitely just because participants later tried to cover it up.
Omar has denied wrongdoing. In a post on X she wrote that she "will not be silenced" and described the probe as an effort to go after political enemies. CBS News asked her attorney for comment and had not received a response. Trump initially said he knew nothing about the investigation. On Monday he called Omar "a terrible person" and said the matter was up to the Justice Department.
Federal officials seldom say much about open criminal investigations beyond confirming a court-authorized search, citing due process protections and the secrecy that surrounds grand juries. Mullin's detailed public comments, on a partisan podcast and with a case still unfiled, are unusual. Omar has been among the president's most frequent targets for years.
