Ilhan Omar breaks silence over alleged marriage to her brother; Trump thinks it's 'really good answer'

In her first interview since federal agents raided her Washington, DC, home, US Congresswoman Ilhan Omar on Wednesday (Oct 21) called allegations that she married her brother “insane.” The Minnesota Democrat also defended her family's finances and said that she is a “working class” and living “paycheck to paycheck.” She also suggested she and her husband had a combined net-worth of some $30 million, but later claimed was a mistake and revised down. She also urged her supporters to donate to her re-election campaign so she could “fight Trump and his administration for trying to intimidate me and so many other people right before the midterm elections.” She also refuted reports reports that investigators obtained her DNA during the search. However, some reports pointed out that she did not fully deny being related to her ex-husband.

Also Read: Trump says Ilhan Omar 'could go to jail' amid federal probe

“Not to my knowledge,” Omar responded, when asked by MS NOW’s Chris Hayes if there was any “weird kernel of truth” to the claim that she wed her brother. Omar said the marriage allegations began on a Somali blog and subsequently spread among conservative commentators. "Somebody put in there that, you know, he had to have been my brother or something to that effect," she said. According to Omar, bloggers "went and like found random people who are like ... 'She introduced him to us and said he was her brother,' which is, you know, insane."

Also Read: Feds obtain DNA evidence that could prove Ilhan Omar married her brother: Report

What is the allegation?

The allegations that have been circulating for over a decade is that Omar entered into a sham marriage with her biological brother, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, to get him a green card. Federal prosecutors are currently investigating whether the 2009 marriage between Representative Omar and Elmi involved a deliberate attempt to circumvent US immigration laws. Federal investigators are examining whether Omar or her late father, Nur Omar Mohamed, provided false information on immigration documents, including details concerning her birth date, according to The New York Post, citing sources familiar with the investigation. Omar emigrated from Somalia with her family in 1995, and reportedly became a US citizen at age 17 through her father's naturalization in 2000.

How Trump reacted?

US President Donald Trump criticized Representative Ilhan Omar’s response of "not to my knowledge" when asked whether she had married her brother, stating, “That’s not a good answer. That’s an answer that a lot of us assume.”