"[126][127][124] Omar has voiced support for a two-state solution to resolve the IsraeliPalestinian conflict. "[116][117] She has said, "we don't need nearly 800 military bases outside the United States to keep our country safe. "[185], On February 4, 2014, Omar was attacked and wounded by multiple attendees during a DFL caucus for Minnesota's House of Representatives District 60B. Stop relying on them", "Trump, Pelosi and other US lawmakers express condolences, condemn Sri Lanka bombings", "Democrat Ilhan Omar refuses to back historic US House resolution on 'Armenian genocide', "Rep. Ilhan Omar slammed for abstaining on Armenian Genocide Resolution", "Minnesota Armenians upset U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar didn't support measure recognizing genocide", "Ilhan Omar Refuses to Back Turkey Armenian Genocide Vote, Demands Slave Trade and Slaughter of Native Americans Also Be Acknowledged", "U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar calls Armenian genocide 'an injustice' after not supporting resolution", "Omar alluded to controversial Armenian genocide vote during Sanders rally", "Ilhan Omar Rebukes Barack Obama for 'Caging of Kids' and 'Droning of Countries Around the World', "Rep. Ilhan Omar criticizes Obama and past presidents' 'really bad policies', "Ilhan Omar says Donald Trump is "really not" human, "silly" to compare him to Barack Obama", "The four House Democrats who voted against the border funding bill", "These 6 House Democrats voted against the infrastructure bill. 20:43 GMT 18 Jul 2019. They were reportedly married in a religious ceremony in 2002. "Ilhan Omar Offers Answers to Questions About Her Marital History." [35][25], Omar attended Thomas Edison High School, from which she graduated in 2001, and volunteered as a student organizer. This story has been shared 272,911 times. , updated The Star Tribune reported that Omar was the youngest of seven siblings, and Elmi is three years younger than she. And why is there no record of Elmi's having applied for or obtained such status if that was the whole point of his supposedly "fraudulent" marriage to his alleged sister? In 2012, Omar and Hirsi reconciled and welcomed their third child. ", In response to the rumor, Omar issued a statement in 2016 describing the issue as one based on "a difficult part of my personal history that I did not consider relevant in the context of a political campaign," and she labeled accusations that her former husband was also her brother "absurd and offensive. "[151] Some members of the Congressional Black Caucus believed Omar was unfairly targeted because she is a black Muslim, saying that "the Democratic leadership did not draft a resolution condemning Donald Trump or other white male Republicans over their antisemitic remarks. 12 August 2016. In her 2016 statement, Omar said that their . [180] She described Trump's action as a "U.S. backed coup" and said that the U.S. should not "hand pick" foreign leaders[181] and should support "Mexico, Uruguay & the Vatican's efforts to facilitate a peaceful dialogue. The resolution "opposes unconstitutional legislative efforts to limit the use of boycotts to further civil rights at home and abroad", and "urges Congress, States, and civil rights leaders from all communities to endeavor to preserve the freedom of advocacy for all by opposing anti-boycott resolutions and legislation". In response, Omar reaffirmed her remarks, insisting that she "should not be expected to have allegiance/pledge support to a foreign country in order to serve my country in Congress or serve on committee. Also, if Ahmed Elmi were truly Omar's brother, why would he have needed to take the drastic step of marrying her in order to secure a path to U.S. citizenship? He has been in Kenya for the last several weeks. [68][69], Omar won the Democratic nomination in the August 11 Democratic primary, in which she faced four opponents. After marrying, they immediately moved to North Dakota and both enrolled at North Dakota State University. He reportedly told investigators that he did not want Muslims in the government. Conservative bloggers have for years claimed that Omar's second husband, British citizen Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, is her brother and that she married him to help him fraudulently gain a US green card. ", He added: "Whether by colluding with right-wing outlets to go after Muslim elected officials or hounding family members, legitimate media outlets have a responsibility not to fan the flames of hate.". [86] The charges are related to Trump's alleged interference in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia and incitement of the attack at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. by his supporters, which occurred during the certification of electoral votes in the 2020 presidential election that affirmed Joe Biden's victory. [18][19] She was the youngest of seven siblings, including sister Sahra Noor. The rumor that Elmi is her brotherfirst emerged on a Somali forum where critics said both Elmi and Omar had the same father because his name was the same. 3. The three government agencies said they would not confirm the existence of any ongoing or potential investigation. Why has Elmi not put the matter to rest by coming forward and explaining the nature of his relationship with Omar? On a marriage certificate dated February 12, 2009, it says that Ilhan Abdullaahi Omar married a man by the name of Ahmed Nur Said Elmi in Hennepin County, Minnesota, who she herself identified as a British citizen. Omar filed to legally divorce Hirsi in October 2019, citing an "irretrievable breakdown of the marriage relationship" in her divorce filings. Omar later clarified that she was referring to the well-documented influence pro-Israeli lobbyists, especially AIPAC, exert in Washington. House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Eliot Engel said it was "deeply offensive to call into question the loyalty of fellow American citizens" and asked Omar to retract her statement. Despite being unverified, the post was picked up by Powerline, a blog that "features commentary on the news from a conservative perspective," who reported in a 12 August 2016 post that: A reader has written us to point out that the Somali website Somalispot posted information suggesting Omar's involvement in marriage and immigration fraud. I have yet to legally divorce Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, but am in the process of doing so. The marriage was criticized a lot, as it was suggested that Elmi and Ilhan were siblings and the sole motive of their marriage was speeding up Elmi's citizenship procedure. In 2008 Omar and Hirsi reached an "impasse" in their relationship and separated (again under Muslim custom). In 2016, he asked for help for an educational program to benefit children in 'Somaliland', an unrecognized but independent state. The former couple first entered a faith-based marriage in 2002 but separated in 2008. However, she had filed tax returns with Hirsi before doing so. [171], Omar has been critical of U.S. foreign policy, and has called for reduced funding for "perpetual war and military aggression,"[172] saying, "knowing my tax dollars pay for bombs killing children in Yemen makes my heart break," with "everyone in Washington saying we don't have enough money in the budget for universal health care, we don't have enough money in the budget to guarantee college education for everyone. Because the marriage was never recognized by law, neither is the separation, 2009: Omar marries Ahmed Elmi in Minneapolis, 2010: He enrolls atNorth Dakota State University to study fine art and lives with Omar as well as her first husband, 2011: Omar claims she and Elmi split this year and he went back to the UK. The duo was never officially married, at least at the time. Not only did all of Omar's six siblings also gain refugee status in the US, but siblings can sponsor one another for residency status and a green card under US immigration law negating the need for Omar and Elmi to commit fraud by getting married if he really were her brother. No hard evidence like a birth certificate or other legal documents has surfaced to prove that Elmi is Omar's brother or that any fraud was committed. After Johnson was elected, she served as his senior policy aide from 2013 to 2015. 23 August 2016. When Omar and Elmi separated in 2011, the congresswoman claimed she couldnt get in touch with him because hed moved to the UK and she didnt know where he was. The couple had two children together from 2002 to 2008. In a statement, the Minneapolis mayor said they planned to work to address "systemic racism in police culture. While Omar soaks up headlines for inciting President Trump, her elusive second husband and rumored sibling has been globe-trotting and sharing his adventures on social media. In 2009, Omar engaged in a civil marriage with Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, a British citizen, but they separated in 2011 (without obtaining a legal divorce), and Elmi returned to England. Coolican, J. Patrick. The couple legally divorced in 2017. [23][24][25][26] She was raised by her father and grandfather, who were moderate Sunni Muslims opposed to the rigid Wahhabi interpretation of Islam. In August 2016, shortly after the rumor originally surfaced, then-U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota Andy Luger countered news reports by stating in a letter sent to an attorney retained by Omar that his office was not investigating criminal accusations related to these rumors. She was fined by Minnesota's campaign-finance watchdog for paying a lawyer with campaign funds to fix the mistake, as federal law prohibits people from filing joint returns with a person who is not their spouse. [193], In April 2019, Omar said that she had received more death threats after Trump made comments about her and 9/11, "many directly referencing or replying to the president's video". Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attributed the ban to Israeli law preventing the entry of people who call for a boycott of Israel (as Omar and Tlaib had done with their support for BDS). According to Omar, in 2011 she and Elmi had a faith-based divorce and she reconciled with Hirsi, with whom she had a third child in 2012. The post notes that Omar married Ahmed Hirsi in 2002. "As soon as Ilhan Omar married him," the post continues, "he started university at her [a]lma mater North Dakota State University where he graduated in 2012. She swore under oath that she did not know the name of a single member of his family and did not know anyone who knew him. Forliti, Amy. She then met and married Elmi, a British citizen, in 2009, according to the statement. In short, he claimed to simply be a . [169] In June 2019, she participated in Twin Cities Pride in Minnesota. Roughly half of the 90,000 tweets mentioning her included hate speech or Islamophobic or anti-immigrant language. [237], In 2017, Time magazine named Omar among its "Firsts: Women who are changing the world," a special report on 46 women who broke barriers in their respective disciplines, and featured her on the cover of its September 18 issue. Omar's father Mohamed, is living in the US. 17 October 2018. [227], In November 2021, Republican Representative Lauren Boebert said she had shared an elevator with Omar, and that she and a Capitol Police officer both mistook Omar for a terrorist. [7][8][9], Omar is the first Somali American and the first naturalized citizen of African birth in the United States Congress, and the first woman of color to represent Minnesota. [211], Foreign media has widely covered Trump's remarks about Omar and The Squad. [191] He pleaded guilty to the offense on November 19. [38][39][40], Omar began her professional career as a community nutrition educator at the University of Minnesota, working in that capacity from 2006 to 2009 in the Greater MinneapolisSaint Paul area. Omar said that relationship ended in 2011 and the two divorced in their faith tradition, but Omar didn't take legal action to divorce him until 2017. And we cannot continue to turn a blind eye to repression in Saudi Arabiaa country that is consistently ranked among the worst of the worst human rights offenders. [29][30][31], Omar's family secured asylum in the U.S. and arrived in New York in 1995,[32][33] then lived for a time in Arlington, Virginia,[25] before moving to and settling in Minneapolis,[25] where her father worked first as a taxi driver and later for the post office. Numerous public documents obtained and reported by news outlets including the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the Washington Examiner, however, cast doubt on Omar's official timeline of her marriage and relationship history. In 2012, as his ex-wife welcomed her third child, he was in Kuala Lumpur. "For someone like me, who left a war-torn country at the age of 8, who got refugee status to come to America, where in the world am I finding a sibling 15 years, 20 years later to seek to do what people accuse me of?" Instead, Omar maintained, she and Hirsi were married in their Muslim "faith tradition.". Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images, NOW WATCH: 8 key takeaways from Trump's State of the Union address, amid other Islamophobic attacks and insults against Omar, In a November 17 speech on the House floor, poured more fuel on the fire in a Tuesday statement, released a lengthy statement when she first ran for office in 2016. [116][117] Omar accused Politico of distorting her comments and said that she had been "saying how [President] Trump is different from Obama, and why we should focus on policy not politics," adding, "One is human, the other is really not. Where he lived before he married Omar in 2009 in Minnesota remains a mystery. Both Ilhan Omar's 2009 marriage documents and her 2017 divorce proceedings state that Ahmed Nur Said Elmi was born on April 4, 1985. We've seen repeated reports alleging that Elmi and Omar are brother and sister. [83], In July 2019, Omar introduced a resolution co-sponsored by Rashida Tlaib and Georgia Representative John Lewis stating that "all Americans have the right to participate in boycotts in pursuit of civil and human rights at home and abroad, as protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution". pic.twitter.com/v3VKm3ysLr, STRANGER THAN FICTION NEWS (@jonrohnson) February 14, 2019. "[129] After reading Weiss's commentary, Omar apologized for not "disavowing the anti-Semitic trope I unknowingly used". Instead, they wed in a traditional Muslim ceremony and had two children before splitting up in 2008, Omar has said. She recalls gum being pressed into her hijab, being pushed down stairs, and physical taunts while she was changing for gym class. 2009: Omar, at 26, marries Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, 23, whom she identifies only as a "British citizen." School records show he attended high school in St. Paul and studied art at North Dakota State University. The Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board said the first-term congresswoman also must pay the state a $500 . They had two children before splitting in 2008. [22] According to MinnPost, the day before the caucus, Minneapolis city council member Abdi Warsame had told Johnson to warn Omar not to attend the meeting. Omar and Hirsi reconciled after that and . "[216], On April 11, 2019, the front page of the New York Post carried an image of the World Trade Center burning following the September 11 terrorist attacks and a quotation from a speech Omar gave the previous month. Coolican, J. Patrick. And also like Ocasio-Cortez, Omar has been a frequent subject of unfounded rumors (particularly ones that have targeted her family and religious background). They didn't succeed in stopping the functions of democracy, but I do believe they succeeded in ending the openness of our democracy. Documented-based reporting by Steinberg, et al. [61] Omar won the August 14 primary with 48.2% of the vote. This material may not be reproduced without permission. As per reports, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi attended North Dakota State University with Omar between 2009 and 2012. Top editors give you the stories you want delivered right to your inbox each weekday. [247][2] In 2017, Elmi and Omar legally divorced,[54] and Omar and Hirsi legally married in 2018. On Thursday, as the chaos from the president's comments erupted in America, Elmi was sharing videos from a beach in Mombasa. Yet Omar has still not explained some discrepancies and inconsistencies in her marriage history. [25][99], On July 19, 2022, after the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, Omar and 17 other members of Congress were arrested in an act of civil disobedience for refusing to clear a street during a protest for reproductive rights outside the Supreme Court Building. The New York Times 30 December 2018. He has shut down a Facebook account he used to use and turned his Instagram account private on Thursday after Trump's comments. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio called Omar's remarks "unacceptable". And more important, if Elmi's intention was to enter into a fraudulent marriage with Omar to gain a green card and settle permanently in the United States, it doesn't explain why he left the US and moved back overseas to London just two years after getting married. Still, documents have not surfaced showing that her ex-husband, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, is her brother. Saudi Arabia, for one", "No, BDS Is Not Anti-Semitic, And Neither Is Ilhan Omar", "Ilhan Omar has become the target of a dangerous hate campaign", "Ilhan Omar: We must apply our universal values to all nations. Omar "was living with her current husband, Ahmed Abdisalan Hirsi, throughout her entire legal marriage to Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, contradicting the story she tells to explain her multiple marriages," the Washington Examiner reported Sunday based on an extensive review of local records such as speeding tickets that display addresses. Elmi is reportedly a British citizen who currently lives in the UK. "[109], Omar opposed the October 2019 Turkish offensive into northeastern Syria, writing that "What has happened after Turkey's invasion of northeastern Syria is a disastertens of thousands of civilians have been forced to flee, hundreds of Islamic State fighters have escaped, and Turkish-backed rebels have been credibly accused of atrocities against the Kurds. They immediately moved to North Dakota and both enrolled at North Dakota and both enrolled at North Dakota University. 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