As Minnesota’s Somali community continues to deal with allegations of rampant fraud, one of the state’s most famous Somali immigrants, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), is reportedly facing scrutiny from House Oversight Committee investigators and federal law enforcement in connection with massive wealth gains tied to her husband’s businesses.
The Backstory
Back in September, AM Update reported the congresswoman’s latest Financial Disclosure Report showed her current husband (i.e. not the brother she allegedly once married) and former political consultant, Tim Mynett, accumulated a net worth listed from $6 million to as much as $30 million in just one year.
The vast majority of that wealth stemmed from his stake in the venture capital firm Rose Lake Capital, valued between $5 million and $25 million, along with a separate ownership stake in a California winery, ranging from $1 million to $5 million. Those two companies went from virtually broke in 2023 to multi-million dollar enterprises in 2024, according to Omar’s disclosures.
News of these probes into the “Squad” member comes amid the revelation of one of the largest pandemic-related fraud cases in the country, centered in her district. Dozens of individuals within the Minnesota Somali community have been charged with plundering taxpayer-funded social services, allegedly billing for meals never provided through programs like Feeding Our Future, which was intended to provide free meals to needy children.
According to The New York Post, Rose Lake Capital quietly scrubbed its online presence, removing references to prominent individuals previously listed as advisors, as the Minnesota fraud prosecutions began coming to light.
Former U.S. Senator from Montana, Democrat Max Baucus, was once listed on the website as an advisor of the company, but he told the Post he had just one phone call with Mynett’s business partner about a potential deal in 2022. Baucus said nothing ever came of the talk beyond some emails. Other former so-called advisors offered similar accounts to the paper.
Potenital Probes
As reported on Wednesday’s AM Update, neither Omar nor Mynett has been formally charged or accused of wrongdoing at this time. Earlier this month, the congresswoman laughed off suspicions about her husband’s wealth on CBS, saying she has been “referred, like, a hundred times” to the House Ethics Committee.
“I mean, ever since I’ve gotten to Congress, they have been doing these sort of weird ethics investigations,” she claimed. “None of them have yielded anything because I have been as transparent as I can be, and there is nothing wrong with any documentation that I have ever provided to the federal government.”
AM Update reached out to Omar’s team and have yet to hear a response.
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