Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minnesota, detailed for the first time Wednesday the early-morning search of her home by federal agents last week, revealing in the process that she can no longer live there due to security concerns.
Omar told MS NOW that she and her husband were initially shocked and confused by the arrival of Homeland Security Investigations agents, who began knocking on doors and yelling at 6 a.m. on October 12.
“Well, I mean, you don’t show up at someone’s house early in the morning unless you want to scare them, and, you know, that obviously did scare all of us,” Omar said.
Federal agents searched Omar’s home as part of a criminal investigation, alarming Justice Department veterans who said it was close to the midterm elections. A person familiar with the investigation told NBC News that possible charges against Omar include conspiracy and making false statements in immigration documents.
Omar told MS NOW that she had “only slept 2.5 hours” when the agents arrived since she returned home early in the morning from a business trip.
“You know, like you’re in a dream, trying to figure out the weird things that are going on,” Omar said. “But they basically surrounded the house. They were banging on the back door and the front door.”
She said she and her husband rushed to get dressed and yelled downstairs to try to get the message across that they were about to go downstairs. Omar added that one of her three children, her 20-year-old son, was also at the residence.
“I thought something was on fire. I thought something happened to the neighbor,” Omar said, adding that she was especially confused when she saw Homeland Security agents at the door because they often focus on issues such as human trafficking, drugs, cybersecurity and terrorism.
“The fact that they showed up at my house early in the morning, you know, it was so weird,” she said. “I was like, ‘Why are you here?'”
Omar said agents showed her the warrant at the door after she asked to see it. They then asked her to sign a document giving up certain rights she had as a member of Congress, Omar said, adding that she refused to sign the document.
Members of Congress are immune from civil and criminal liability related to their legislative acts under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause.
Omar said in an interview that agents took 17 items from her home, including old cellphones belonging to her and one of her daughters. Seizing the phones of sitting members of Congress typically triggers a series of enforcement protocols to ensure that speech or debate terms are upheld.
Omar told MS NOW the search took “four or five hours.”
“I don’t think I could call my attorney until about an hour after the search started,” she said. Asked what she was doing during that time, she said: “I was sitting on the couch, staring at the warrant, trying to make sure they were complying with what the warrant allowed them to do.”
The Department of Homeland Security referred NBC News to the Justice Department, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Omar’s description of the search.
Omar said that in addition to her cellphone, agents took several items from her husband, Tim Meinette, including a camera passed down from his uncle, a Somali phrasebook he used to learn Somali and his notebooks.
Omar said she doesn’t believe agents took anything with her DNA, based on the receipt she was given after the search. She also said she was not asked to provide a DNA sample.
Omar said that overall, agents “mostly behaved appropriately.”
“They did a great job putting everything back in its place,” Omar said. “They even folded some of my clothes that weren’t folded.”
Still, Omar criticized the federal investigation.
“People who knock on my door looking for documents actually have his documents,” Omar said, referring to documents filed by her late father. “They are the ones who helped us come to America.”
She said she can no longer live in her Washington home after the search.
“Obviously, I can’t continue to live there because our address is public,” Omar said. “Given the death threats I faced, it was no longer feasible to have my children visit on and off in that house and have people track them.”
Omar rejected President Donald Trump’s insistence that he had “nothing to do” with the investigation.
“I mean, it’s all about him,” she said. “You know, this goes back to 2019 when he was screaming about the fact that, you know, I, I need to be deported, I need to be deported.”
Omar has been a target of Trump’s attacks since his first term. He called her “trash”, accused her of fraud and called for her to be deported.
Omar said she was “confident in her truth” as she again denied the accusations against her.
“How obvious can these people be? You know, like, you can at least look like it’s not fiction,” Omar said. “But they blatantly chose to make it clear to every character involved that they did not want me to remain in the United States.”