Rep. Ilhan Omar is demanding answers from federal immigration officials after an undercover Homeland Security Investigations agent was found parked outside her Minnesota town hall, raising questions about whether the Trump administration has used ICE to monitor political opponents.
According to a letter Omar sent to HSI, a branch of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a Richfield police officer noticed a woman in a Ford Explorer monitoring the community center where Omar was holding an event the previous evening. The officer discovered that the vehicle's license plates were registered to another vehicle.
Omar said the woman initially identified herself as security before contacting her supervisor and saying she was an HSI agent conducting an undercover drug operation nearby. Local police had not been informed of the operation, according to the congresswoman.
"At worst, it emphasizes many Americans' growing concern that the Trump administration uses ICE to surveil political opponents and may interfere with our democracy," Omar wrote.
The congresswoman asked HSI to explain why the agent was at the community center, when the agency learned about her town hall and whether HSI personnel have observed other activities involving local, state or federal officials in Minnesota.
The incident comes amid an ongoing dispute between Omar and the administration over federal immigration enforcement in Minnesota. She has repeatedly called for investigations into the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two U.S. citizens killed by federal immigration agents this year.
In April, Omar criticized the lack of accountability in Good's January killing after reports that the ICE agent who shot her had returned to work while the federal investigation remained unresolved. Omar herself was attacked during a January town hall while calling for ICE to be abolished. A man sprayed her with an unknown substance from a syringe and was subsequently charged with assault.
Afterward, Omar said President Donald Trump's repeated criticism of her had contributed to threats against her. "Every time the president of the United States has chosen to use hateful rhetoric to talk about me and the community that I represent, my death threats skyrocket," she said at the time.
