As 2026 got underway, Donald Trump said his Justice Department had launched an investigation into Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat whom the president seems to hate more than most other members of Congress. By the president’s telling, the DOJ probe followed a directive posted to his social media platform in which he said officials should investigate Omar for unspecified “Financial and Political Crimes.”
There was no way to know whether Trump’s claims were true or made up, but JD Vance spoke to reporters this week at a White House press briefing, during which the vice president confirmed that Trump’s DOJ really is going after the progressive congresswoman.
In response to a question about the administration’s interest in Omar, Vance said:
I don’t want to prejudge an investigation. I mean, you read the things about Ilhan Omar and about who she married and whether she didn’t marry this person or that person. It certainly seems like something fishy is there, but everybody’s entitled to equal justice under the laws. So, we’re going to investigate it, we’re going to take a look at it. If we think that there’s a crime, we’re going to prosecute that crime. And that’s something the Department of Justice is looking at right now.
In fairness, it’s important to emphasize that Joe Biden’s DOJ, which targeted so many Democrats that it practically seemed as if it had been weaponized against the Democratic president’s own party, launched its own investigation in 2024 into Omar and her finances. That probe reportedly fizzled for lack of evidence, and she was not charged.
Two years later, the Minnesota lawmaker is apparently facing another DOJ investigation related to her marriage, which the White House considers “fishy.”
If these circumstances sound at all familiar, it’s probably because Trump’s DOJ has investigated (and at times, indicted) a great many people the president has deemed political enemies.
Former FBI Director James Comey is certainly among the first names that come to mind — it was, after all, just three weeks ago when Trump’s DOJ indicted Comey, saying he used Instagram to call for violence against the president by way of a seashell-related code, which came roughly a month after the DOJ tried and failed to find evidence of Biden having committed a crime.
A month before that, Trump’s DOJ tried and failed to secure felony indictments against six Democratic members of Congress (two senators and four House members) because they appeared in a video urging military service members to disregard illegal orders.
The move didn’t turn out well — regular citizens on a grand jury rejected the ridiculous gambit — but the fact that such an effort was made against a group of military and intelligence veterans who had done nothing wrong was similarly indefensible.
What’s more, the apparent demise of that case didn’t negate the fact that Team Trump is still pursuing cases against a lengthy list of other Democrats, including Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, New York Attorney General Letitia James, Sen. Adam Schiff of California and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.
A few months ago, the president denied having weaponized the criminal justice system, suggesting instead that he merely directs the DOJ, which he controls, to prosecute members of his enemies list — preferably quickly — without regard for evidence or legal merits. That he was effectively confessing to weaponizing the DOJ appeared lost on him.
It’s a detail to keep in mind as the scandal surrounding Trump’s new $1.7 billion “weaponization” fund moves forward.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
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