Obama says Trump administration probe of congresswoman Ilhan Omar is 'so appalling'

Obama says Trump administration probe of congresswoman Ilhan Omar is 'so appalling'

Barack Obama has said congresswoman Ilhan Omar is facing a federal criminal investigation simply because she is a vocal critic of President Donald Trump.

“The full weight of the federal government is being brought down on a law-abiding elected official because she has dared to criticize the president,” the former US president wrote on X, describing the probe as “so appalling”.

The White House defended the investigation, saying the justice department was “focused on restoring law and order”.

Last week, homeland security agents searched the Minnesota Democrat’s Washington DC home as part of an inquiry into her immigration status. Omar was born in Somalia and came to the US with her family as a child.

US media outlets have reported that the investigation is linked to her American citizenship and to whether she lied about her age when she arrived in the US in 1995.

Questions have been raised over whether the age on Omar’s citizenship application was different from her actual birth date.

In his X post on Sunday, Obama said her father became a naturalised citizen when she was 17, and not yet legally an adult, which then gave her citizenship.

“Now the Administration is actively trying to deport Congresswoman Omar, seemingly based solely on the unsubstantiated theory that she was actually 18 when her father was naturalized, and therefore is not a citizen,” he wrote.

“If this becomes the new normal,” he added, “there's no reason to believe it will stop with her - or that future presidents, in either party, won't do the same.”

According to the US Citizenship and Immigration Services, a child born outside the US automatically becomes a citizen when he or she has at least one parent who is a citizen by birth or naturalisation, or when he or she is under 18, is a lawful permanent resident, and is living in the custody of a citizen parent.

White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis denied that the investigation was politically motivated.

“Unlike Joe Biden, President Trump has not weaponized the Department of Justice against his political foes,” she said in an emailed statement.

“The Department is focused on restoring law and order and keeping Americans safe.”

Trump has frequently claimed that federal criminal investigations against him during his re-election campaign were politically driven.

The inquiry into Omar could result in the justice department seeking to “denaturalise” her, or strip away her citizenship. To do so, it would need to prove there were material lies in the naturalisation process.

In 2023, Republicans removed Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee over comments and tweets she made about Israel, prompting bipartisan criticism.

Omar has said Trump has targeted her for years with “baseless lies and smear campaigns” and called the investigation “the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation”.

Trump, however, has said the investigation had “nothing to do” with him, while calling Omar a “terrible person” and a “complainer”.

Federal agents reportedly took her phone, computers, notebooks and passport in Monday’s raid.

Her lawyers have asked the government to return her property, CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, has reported, saying in a letter sent on Friday that the search violated restrictions imposed by a judge to protect her work as a federal lawmaker.

The lawyers also claimed agents failed to properly notify Omar or the House of Representatives general counsel that a search was going to happen, and prevented her from contacting her attorney for more than an hour, according to CBS.

Democrats described the raid as the president trying to interfere with the legislative branch of government. Republicans, meanwhile, said Omar should be treated like anyone else under the law.

When Obama first ran for president, and throughout his two terms in the White House, Trump repeatedly questioned his citizenship, claiming he was not born on American soil and was therefore ineligible to serve in office. Obama released two records showing he had been born in Hawaii.

Obama did not refer to that history in his X post on Sunday.