SCOOP: Historian Researching Ilhan Omar’s Colonel Father Warned To Avoid Minneapolis Over Clan Violence
A Somali-born historian who researched the role of Rep. Ilhan Omar's father in the bloody regime of dictator Siad Barre found his trip to Minnesota canceled this week, allegedly due to the potential for clan violence.
Emily Kopp · Nov 12, 2026 · 7 min read
A Somali-born historian who researched the role of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s father in the bloody regime of dictator Siad Barre found his trip to Minnesota canceled this week, allegedly due to the potential for clan violence.
Mohamed Haji Ingiriis, a Somali-born fellow at King’s College in London, was scheduled to receive a Somali Hero Award in Minneapolis on Nov. 14 for his scholarship. But the event organizers warded him off at the last minute, Ingiriis told the Daily Caller News Foundation, saying that any Somali who has been critical of the congresswoman cannot safely travel to Minneapolis.
The organizers revoked his airline ticket and pulled the award, alleges Ingiriis, who earned his African history PhD at the University of Oxford. Deleted Facebook posts indexed by Google indicate his participation was canceled.
Ali Gaashaan, the president of the Somali Hero Awards, denied Ingiriis’s version of events in texts to the DCNF. Gaashaan said that he “has never heard threats of violence against any critic” of Omar.
Presented with a report by Alpha News detailing online threats by a man tied to Omar, Gaashaan alleged that Alpha News and the DCNF have “an extreme right-wing agenda.” Asked why Ingiriis’s participation in the event was canceled, Gaashaan did not reply.
In the course of researching the Barre regime, Ingiriis uncovered information that undermines the heart of Omar’s meteoric rise in politics — her origin story as a Somali refugee escaping persecution.
“Of the many titles I hold … one represents a part of my identity that I hold particularly close to my heart: refugee,” she wrote in 2024.
That may be a macabre inversion of the truth.
According to Ingiriis’s research, Omar’s father’s name is Nur Said Elmi, despite her claims to the contrary. In 1989, Barre’s military dictatorship in Somalia began to crumble after years of violent rebellion by rival clans. Many senior military officers deserted. But Colonel Nur Said Elmi remained loyal.