Gambiaj.com – (WASHINGTON, United States) – Democrats on Monday accused President Donald Trump and his administration of reviving a years-long racist and xenophobic campaign against Rep. Ilhan Omar after federal agents raided the Minnesota congresswoman’s Washington-area home less than three weeks before the US midterm elections.
The pre-dawn search by Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative arm of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, immediately became a political flashpoint, with Democrats portraying it as the latest escalation in Trump’s attacks on one of his most prominent critics and a Somali-born Muslim member of Congress.
“This is a gross abuse of power and the latest in a decade-long, racist smear campaign against a duly elected Black Congresswoman,” Rep. Ayanna Pressley, a Massachusetts Democrat, said Monday. She accused Trump of weaponizing the Justice Department to “fuel hate” and intimidate political opponents.
Omar herself accused the administration of “political intimidation,” saying the raid was an attempt to target a political enemy and weaponize federal law enforcement.
“For ten years, Trump has targeted me with baseless lies and smear campaigns,” Omar said. “This is just the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation. I will not be silenced.”
Democrats link raid to Trump’s attacks on Omar
The search came after years of public attacks by Trump and other Republicans over Omar’s Somali background, immigration history, and political views.
Trump has repeatedly questioned Omar’s right to remain in the United States and has made her immigration history a recurring theme in his attacks. As recently as Saturday, he referred to Omar at a Tennessee rally and said Vice President JD Vance and administration officials were investigating her.
The Congressional Black Caucus said Monday that the raid appeared designed to cast suspicion on Omar and “manufacture an appearance of wrongdoing” on the eve of the midterm elections. Chair Yvette Clarke described it as an example of the administration weaponizing federal law enforcement against a sitting member of Congress who has been an outspoken critic of Trump.
House Democratic leaders Hakeem Jeffries, Katherine Clark, and Pete Aguilar likewise described the raid as “deeply disturbing,” pointing to what they called years of personal attacks and baseless accusations against Omar.
They vowed that Democrats would seek accountability for what they characterized as an abuse of power if they gained control of the House.
Immigration investigation provides basis for search
The Justice Department, however, says the operation was legally authorized.
A department spokesperson said HSI agents executed a judicially authorized search warrant in the Washington area as part of an ongoing federal criminal investigation. The department did not publicly disclose the specific allegations behind the warrant.
People familiar with the investigation told US media that it concerns allegations involving Omar’s immigration paperwork, including documents reportedly completed by her late father when she was a child. Omar has denied wrongdoing.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said last month that his department was investigating whether there had been violations of immigration law connected to Omar’s family’s arrival in the United States.
The administration has rejected accusations that the investigation is politically motivated, saying federal agencies are enforcing immigration law rather than targeting Omar because she is a Democrat.
Timing intensifies political fallout
The timing of the raid has nevertheless become central to the Democratic response.
Omar is on the ballot in November, and the search occurred roughly three weeks before the midterm elections. The Justice Department has historically sought to avoid overt investigative actions involving political candidates in the immediate run-up to elections, although the department has not said the search violated that policy.
For Democrats, the timing reinforces their argument that the administration is using Omar’s immigration history as a political weapon at a moment when control of Congress is at stake.
For Trump and his allies, the investigation provides another opportunity to keep Omar’s immigration history and Somali background at the center of the political debate.
Omar, who fled Somalia as a child and arrived in the United States as a refugee in 1995, became one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress when she won her House seat in 2018. Her rise has made her a prominent progressive voice, and a longstanding target of Trump and the political right.
The raid therefore places an already deeply personal political conflict at the centre of the final weeks before the midterms, with Democrats framing it as a racist smear and abuse of federal power, while the administration maintains that it is a legitimate criminal investigation backed by a judicial warrant.
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