Federal immigration agents searched Rep. Ilhan Omar’s Washington home Monday, just 22 days before she’s on the ballot in Minnesota.
The move breaks with the Justice Department’s long-standing “60-day rule,” an unwritten, post-Watergate norm that keeps prosecutors from taking public steps like search warrants or indictments in politically sensitive cases right before an election. Legal experts say none of the usual exceptions, like risk of destroyed evidence or public safety, appear to apply here.
Investigators are reportedly looking into whether Omar or her father lied on immigration forms decades ago. Claims about her immigration history have circulated on the right for years, but the officials promoting them haven’t produced evidence to back them up. Omar called the search “the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation.”
The DOJ says the rule is “an informal practice, not written policy.” But in 2024, Trump himself insisted the department was barred from doing an...