ILHAN OMAR’S EX-HUSBAND AND ALLEGED BROTHER CALLS HIMSELF A GAY MAN IN WOKE RESEARCH PAPER
Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, the man Rep. Ilhan Omar legally married in 2009 and divorced in 2017, has described himself as a gay man of the East African diaspora in an August 2026 academic paper. The paper, titled Out in the Field: Notes on Researching Queer Violence in Kenya, was published while Elmi works as a doctoral researcher at the University of Bristol.
In the piece he wrote: As a gay man of the East African diaspora, my fieldwork was never neutral. It was a space shaped by tension, risk, intimacy, and vulnerability. He went on to say he immersed himself in the lived experiences of the people he interviewed while negotiating his own safety and the complexities of his identity. This is the first time Elmi has publicly stated his sexual orientation in his own words.
The revelation lands in the middle of long-running questions about the marriage. Elmi moved in with Omar and her first husband, Ahmed Hirsi, in Minnesota in 2009. A friend of Hirsi later described Elmi as an extremely feminine Somali guy who was walking around in tight female clothing, which is heavily frowned upon in the Somali community. According to that account, Hirsi said it was his wife’s brother from London and that Omar had married Elmi legally to get him papers while Hirsi remained only Islamically married to her. Omar had a third child with Hirsi in 2012 while still legally married to Elmi. Elmi left Minnesota in 2012 and the couple’s divorce was finalized in 2017.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly accused Elmi of being Omar’s brother. Federal investigators are examining whether the marriage was part of a scheme to commit immigration fraud. Omar has denied wrongdoing. When asked earlier this month whether she is related to Elmi at all, she answered, Not to my knowledge.
Tabloids have long described Elmi as flamboyant and noted his social media posts calling himself a dirty dandy. The new paper supplies the first explicit confirmation from Elmi himself.
The same researcher who was brought into Omar’s household and given a legal marriage that critics say was arranged for papers is now publishing academic reflections on queer identity and violence in Kenya.
Omar’s office and Elmi did not respond to requests for comment on the paper.
Sources: Daily Caller, New York Post, TMZ, NewsNation, Hindustan Times.