Rep. Ilhan Omar allegedly lied about her birth year, becoming a citizen: Report

A former congressional candidate in Minnesota is calling for Congress to launch an inquiry into the status of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) based on allegations that the Democrat congresswoman lied about her birth year and the age she claimed to be when she became a citizen.

During a recent interview with Alpha News, former congressional candidate A.J. Kern explained that she has uncovered evidence that disputes Omar’s story of how she obtained U.S. citizenship based on her birth year. Kern claimed that Omar was 18 when her father became eligible to apply for citizenship in 2000. 

In an interview with The Intercept in 2018, Omar claimed that she became a U.S. citizen before she turned 18. “My father became a citizen and so I got my citizenship through that process,” Omar stated. 

According to Kern’s website, foreign-born children can obtain U.S. citizenship through their parents through the application for citizenship under Section 322 of the Immigration and Naturalization Act, through acquisition of citizenship, and through derivation of citizenship; however, Kern claims that Omar would not have been eligible for any of the three processes due to her age and her parents’ citizenship status.

“So to me, this was like, completely a red flag that I had figured out that she actually wasn’t a minor when her father could apply for naturalization,” Kern told Alpha News. “So it kind of blows a hole in her story that she obtained naturalization or citizenship when she was 17. On top of that, not anyone has ever verified her citizenship, not the Minnesota Secretary of State, the FEC, or Congress itself.”

Alpha News reported that Omar’s most recently updated page in the Minnesota Legislative Reference Library lists the congresswoman’s birth date as October 4, 1982. However, an archived page lists her birth date as October 4, 1981.

“I believe that the whole narrative that Ilhan Omar became a citizen at the age of 17, that narrative that’s documented has been sold for so long that people have bought into it and they believe it,” Kern said. 

“But where’s the documentation? No one has seen her official naturalization records. No one, not the Minnesota secretary of state, not the Federal Election Commission, not Congress, and there is enough evidence now, especially in changing her birth year. I mean, who does that?” Kern added. “Who goes to that effort of, ‘Oh, I’m in Congress now, and I’ve just noticed that my birth year is incorrect.’ No, that’s a red flag.”

Kern suggested that Congress should launch an inquiry into Omar’s citizenship because “there is enough evidence that calls into question whether she’s actually a citizen.” Kern noted that it is important Congress ensures that “we do not have a foreign nationalist, a Somali nationalist, occupying a seat in Congress, affecting laws that govern the United States of America.”