Homan says Omar could “of course” be denaturalized and deported if evidence supports it
White House border czar Tom Homan said Saturday that the Trump administration could “of course” seek to strip Rep. Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota, of her citizenship and deport her, the first remarks explicitly raising denaturalization and deportation in connection with Omar to be attributed by name to a top administration official since federal agents searched her Washington home on Oct. 12, The Guardian reported.
Asked in a Fox News interview whether the criminal investigation into Omar could involve “denaturalizing and then deporting her,” Homan answered: “Of course.” He added: “If you lie during the naturalization process, there is a process to denaturalize somebody. We’ve done it before. It’s a long, tedious process, but it’s been done before. And certainly, if the evidence points that way, that could happen.” Homan also implied the government is investigating Omar over other allegations but declined to elaborate, saying: “I know things, but that’s a question for the FBI.”
Homan told Fox News he was informed by investigators that they have been following strong evidence since multiple court-authorized search warrants were executed on Omar’s home, The Hill reported. “If she violated law then she’d be held accountable,” he said, adding that she would receive no special treatment. Omar has not been charged with a crime and has denied the allegations, calling the investigation politically motivated.
In a separate interview Thursday with Andrew Kolvet, host of The Charlie Kirk Show, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin denied the investigation was politically driven. “We wouldn’t move forward, and President Trump didn’t want to move forward either, unless we knew that it couldn’t be politically driven,” Mullin said, calling it “a strong case.” Presenting a hypothetical scenario in which a person filled out immigration paperwork unlawfully and allowed others to enter the country under them, Mullin asked: “Then that can be considered a RICO case, right? Because there was conspiracy to deceive the American government.”
The investigation, launched weeks before the November midterm elections in which Omar is on the ballot, is examining whether Omar or her family violated the law in obtaining her citizenship, according to the reports. Multiple members of Omar’s family, including her brother and her sister, were subpoenaed, and her phone was seized in the search. Omar, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Somalia, was a child when her father filled out the immigration paperwork now under scrutiny; her father, Nur Omar Mohamed, died in June 2020. Her attorneys have called the search “neither justified nor lawful” and demanded the return of her property.
The probe comes as the administration pursues dozens of denaturalization cases nationwide against foreign-born citizens it claims obtained citizenship fraudulently; as of April, the Justice Department had reportedly identified nearly 400 foreign-born citizens it sought to investigate, The Guardian noted. The denaturalization process requires a federal investigation and drawn-out court proceedings.