Questions about the family connections of Ilhan Omar have resurfaced following reports that a Minneapolis health clinic run by her sister received millions of dollars in government funding during and after the Minnesota Democrat’s time in state and federal office.
According to reporting citing public records and archived online material, Omar’s older sister, Sahra Noor, served as CEO of People’s Center Clinics & Services from July 2014 to April 2018. The nonprofit operates in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, an area often nicknamed “Little Mogadishu” because of its large Somali immigrant population.
During Noor’s tenure, the clinic received a $2.2 million allocation in the 2017 capital budget approved by the Minnesota Legislature. Omar began serving in the Minnesota House of Representatives that same year, starting a two-year term in January 2017.
The clinic itself has received roughly $33 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services since 2002, according to available records. The organization also participated in the federal 340B Drug Pricing Program through a contract pharmacy agreement signed in 2015 with Degdeg’s Carepoint Pharmacy, which later lost its license in 2017 and is now listed as permanently closed.
Omar later highlighted the state funding for the clinic and appeared at a 2022 event celebrating renovations to the facility alongside figures including Amy Klobuchar and Jacob Frey. The upgrades included a walk-in clinic, fitness center, prayer room, and a multilingual call center serving East African languages such as Somali, Oromo, and Amharic.
After being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, Omar secured an additional $1 million in congressionally directed funding for renovations at the same clinic in 2022. At the time, she stated that “neither I nor my immediate family has any financial interest in this project.” In April 2024, the clinic publicly credited Omar for helping secure the federal funding.
Following her time leading the Minneapolis clinic, Noor moved to Africa and launched a healthcare consultancy called Grit Partners in Kenya. The firm described its work as facilitating “peer learning session” projects funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
Noor’s husband, Mohamed Keynan, has also held several roles in Minnesota government before later serving in high-level advisory roles in Somalia. According to his professional profile, he worked as chief of staff to former Somali Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khayre and as a policy adviser to former Somali President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, widely known as Farmaajo. Before relocating abroad, Keynan worked in positions with the Minnesota Department of Human Services and local government bodies in the Twin Cities area.
Noor also co-founded a telehealth startup called Hello! Caafi in 2020, with the stated mission of connecting Somali-speaking medical professionals with patients in Somalia. The company said it sought to expand healthcare access through remote consultations, though its website has since gone offline and its social media presence has not been updated since 2022.
Separately, investigative reporting has also revisited longstanding questions about Omar’s past marriage to Ahmed Nur Said Elmi. Some critics have alleged Elmi may be related to the congresswoman; an allegation Omar has repeatedly denied.
In 2017 court filings related to a divorce, Omar said she had not seen Elmi in six years and had no way to contact him. However, journalist David Steinberg previously reported discovering Elmi’s name embedded in the source code of the Grit Partners website, suggesting he may have helped create a social media link for the company. Critics have argued that the finding raises questions about the claim that Omar had no way to contact him.
The allegations and connections have been the subject of ongoing political debate and media scrutiny, though no legal finding has yet established wrongdoing related to Omar’s family ties or the funding directed to the Minneapolis clinic.
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WHY IS THE US GOVERNMENT ALLOWING OMAR TO CONTINUE RIPPING US OFF? WE REALLY NEED A NEW LAW THAT TOTALLY PREVENTS ANYONE NOT BORN AND EDUCATED IN THE USA TO HOLD A PUBLIC OFFICE OF ANY KIND.