“No one is above the law.”
That’s what House Democrat Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said after the Biden Justice Department indicted Donald Trump nearly a year after an unprecedented raid on his Mar-a-Lago estate. But now that one of their own has found herself the subject of a federal search, Jeffries and his party are singing a different tune.
The search at issue happened early Monday morning at the Washington, D.C., residence of Rep. Ilham Omar, D-Minn. According to sources who spoke with Fox News, federal Homeland Security Investigations agents executed the judicially authorized search as part of a “criminal fraud investigation into the Somali-born congresswoman’s immigration paperwork, which was filled out by her late father when she was a child.”
Omar has faced notable allegations of corruption through the years, some of which rest on “extensive evidence suggesting that the Muslim representative legally married her flamboyant brother before a Christian minister,” as Federalist Senior Contributor Ben Weingarten reported.
Omar predictably cast Monday’s search on her estate as “an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement” — a talking point quickly adopted by Jeffries and fellow Democrats. But such rhetoric is a significant departure from Democrats’ gleeful response to the Biden FBI’s 2022 raid on Mar-a-Lago, which came as part of Jack Smith‘s illegal classified documents lawfare against Trump.
Presidential wannabe and Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., released a video message on Monday decrying the search of Omar’s home as a “targeting” of Trump’s “political opponents.” He also seemingly suggested that the move was based on the fact that Omar is Muslim.
That response is a complete 180-degree turn from the one Khanna gave following the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago infiltration. Appearing on MSNBC, the California congressman defended the Biden administration’s actions as “non-political” and claimed that the FBI had “some probable evidence about possible wrongdoing” since it got a judge to sign off on the search warrant.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., characterized the search of Omar’s residence as “a disgusting abuse of power” and “a dangerous sign of an authoritarian president who will stop at nothing to distract you from his deep unpopularity with the American people.” When it came to the raid on Mar-a-Lago, however, Jayapal applauded the Biden administration and said that Trump “should be in jail.”
Former Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., similarly came rushing to Omar’s defense by claiming that the search of her home is designed to satisfy Trump’s base, whom he called “blood-thirsty” and “racist.” Yet, when pressed by CNN after the Mar-a-Lago raid about whether Congress should investigate Trump over the classified documents issue, the ex-Squad member defended the raid and fervently agreed by saying, “Oh, absolutely. Trump should be investigated for many things.”
Omar’s Islamist sister-from-a-different-mister and fellow Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., also threw her “Trump is grossly abusing his power” hot-take out on social media. The America-hating congresswoman notably defended the Biden DOJ’s raid on Trump’s home with Democrats’ played out “No one is above the law” schtick.
Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., is another Democrat now criticizing the feds’ Omar search after previously trotting out the Trump is “not above the law” talking point to run interference for the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid.
Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. His work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics and RealClearHealth. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood