Halima Salman, 27, was convicted on Tuesday of joining the Islamic State and receiving military training in Syria, marking the first public conviction of a woman for joining ISIS by an American court. She now faces up to 10 years in prison.
We have come to expect sanctimony mixed with hypocrisy from Barack Obama. But his latest endeavor turns out to be a doozy.
Preaching his usual moral superiority, the former president recently took to social media to inveigh against the current president for targeting Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota with a criminal investigation. He called it "appalling."
Obama should have sat this one out at his luxurious spread on Martha’s Vineyard.
Lo and behold, he did the same thing when he was president. And Omar was the target. But, of course, the probe was kept under wraps. Until now.
Reporting by The New York Times reveals that Obama’s Department of Homeland Security and the FBI did a deep dive in the summer of 2016 into whether Omar entered into a sham marriage with her alleged brother, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, to enable him to secure a green card.
Brace yourself for the result. That investigation "found some evidence that it was fraudulent," according to the Times.
Accusations of marriage fraud have long dogged Omar, who has consistently dismissed them as politically driven and a right-wing conspiracy. So much for that argument.
The latest investigation that culminated in a judicially ordered search of Omar’s home on October 12, 2026, reportedly encompasses not only the suspect marriage but troubling questions over whether she ran afoul of the law by using a fake name and false birth date to obtain citizenship. A separate investigation is examining her financial transactions.
The Obama-era inquiry did not end because of insufficient evidence. Instead, the Times divulges that it was shelved "because prosecutors concluded that the potential crime, a felony, fell outside a five-year statute of limitations." The newspaper’s story relied on statements by current and former officials with knowledge of the first case.
That decision to mothball any legal action against Omar makes little sense, unless one factors in political favoritism by Obama and his prosecutorial cohorts.
It is true that marriage fraud is a federal felony governed by a five-year statute of limitations under 8 U.S.C. § 1325(c). However, the clock runs from the last overt act of fraud or submission of false documents, not the date of the wedding ceremony itself in 2009.
Taking steps to later obtain a green card would qualify as an overt act, as would document fraud (18 U.S.C. § 1546). So, too, would any act to cover up a sham marriage or efforts to conceal it. Indeed, it would constitute additional crimes such as conspiracy (18 U.S.C. § 371) and obstruction of justice or obstruction of proceedings (18 U.S.C. §§ 1505 and 1512).
Elmi abandoned his quest for a green card and left the U.S. for London sometime in 2011 when disturbing questions reportedly arose over his application. His actions and any misrepresentations associated with Omar might have brought the case within the permissible statute of limitations.
Obama’s DHS and DOJ could have pursued a simpler approach under civil (not criminal) immigration fraud. Orchestrating a scheme to illegally obtain U.S. immigration status or benefits carries severe legal consequences. There is no statute of limitations.
If the Obama administration had chosen this logical course, it could have led to Omar’s denaturalization and subsequent deportation. The standard of proof is "clear and convincing evidence," much lower than in criminal prosecutions.
It is unclear, but curious, why this legal road was never taken. We only know that authorities under Obama shuttered the case and buried the investigation. Preferential treatment? Political cronyism? It has the unmistakable stench.
This makes Obama’s social media screed against President Trump even more outlandish. Trump is doing what Obama did, except that Trump’s administration has expanded the Omar inquiry into areas where the former president’s prosecutors refused to go.
They should have gone there.
Obama’s harangue on X accused Trump of selectively targeting Omar without ever disclosing that his own administration investigated her first. That was dishonesty by omission. A mere oversight? Doubtful.
Obama also pronounced as true certain facts about Omar’s age that may not be true at all. He declared with absolute confidence that she was 17 years old when she applied as a minor for derivative citizenship based on her father’s citizenship.
But her age and birth date are still very much in dispute. Her autobiography and other documents undermine Obama’s claim, indicating that Omar may have been an adult of 18 years and legally ineligible for the type of citizenship that she procured. If she or her father made false statements or committed fraud, it would nullify her citizenship and could lead to removal from the U.S.
This is not an "unsubstantiated theory," as Obama asserts in his social media post.
The former president accuses Trump of "intimidation" and laments that he is deploying "the full weight of the federal government" to bring down "a law-abiding elected official because she has dared to criticize the president." Spare us the duplicitous pearl-clutching.
Obama expressed no moral outrage when his successor, Joe Biden, targeted his political opponent with criminal indictments. Going back further to his own presidency, Obama’s dirty fingerprints were all over the initial stages of the government’s damaging investigation of Trump in the phony collusion scandal.
Obama seems to think that Americans are simpletons with anterograde amnesia. It resembles contempt.
The New York Times report exposes Obama’s glaring double standard for what it is — a transparently insincere attack based on shallow evidence. This comes as no surprise.
Obama always seems confident in his righteousness in an irritatingly pious way. Ever the charlatan, he pretends to be holier-than-thou. Sometimes the truth catches up with him.
But don’t expect Obama to change now that his hypocrisy has been revealed. That would require earnest introspection.
The FBI confirmed that federal and state agencies were conducting "court-authorized investigative activity" at multiple locations across Minnesota, including sites in the Twin Cities and Rochester, according to MPR News. Meanwhile, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison's office also confirmed that its Medicaid Fraud Control Unit executed search warrants at Iska Inc. in St. Louis Park and Bright Horizon Therapy in Edina, both of which provide autism-related or other Medicaid-funded services.
The operation involved the FBI, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, IRS criminal investigators, U.S. Postal Inspectors and the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, according to FOX 9 Minneapolis.
"This is an active investigation, and no further details are available at this time," FBI Minneapolis spokesperson Matt Vogel told MPR News.
Iska Inc. received more than $16.7 million in Medicaid payments between 2018 and 2025, according to state data reviewed by the Minnesota Star Tribune. The business participated in Minnesota's Early Intensive Developmental and Behavioral Intervention program, which provides services to children and young people with autism and has faced increasing scrutiny over fraud allegations.
The latest searches follow a series of enforcement operations targeting suspected fraud in Minnesota's publicly funded programs. In April, federal and state investigators executed 22 search warrants in Minnesota, including at autism service providers and childcare businesses.
The Justice Department also announced charges against 15 defendants in May in connection with alleged health care fraud schemes involving more than $90 million in intended losses. The cases included an alleged $46.6 million scheme targeting Minnesota's autism intervention program, which DOJ said saw Medicaid claims surge from more than $600,000 in 2018 to more than $400 million by 2025.
The raids come ahead of Vice President JD Vance's planned visit to Minnesota — alongside members of the White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud — where allegations of public-services fraud have fueled growing questions about oversight.
“Is she alive or not?” That is the torturous uncertainty Shayna Feinman’s family has lived with for the past four days. The last time the American woman was seen alive was more than two years ago, in March 2024, while she was walking to a friend’s house in Yavapai County, Arizona. Since then she has been missing and presumed dead. That was until October 24, when the Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection (SSPC) of Tijuana, Mexico, announced on social media that she had been found alive. However, in a turn of events Kara Feinman, her sister, described on her Facebook page as “turmoil” and “heartbreaking,” authorities in Arizona said their Mexican counterparts were plainly wrong, having located and identified a different person by mistake.
The Justice Department's Antisemitism Task Force Chairman Leo Terrell is taking the Trump administration’s fight against antisemitism directly into Jewish communities on a 15-city nationwide tour, and he says he means business.
Terrell told Fox News Digital that local leaders have too often failed to respond while Jewish Americans face threats in their schools, workplaces and houses of worship.
"The whole purpose of this tour is to go to where the problem is at, to address their needs, and to provide them with federal support," Terrell said. "Antisemitism is now, and we have to come up with solutions for the future."
The "American Tour Against Hate" began Oct. 14 in Michigan, bringing representatives from the Justice Department, FBI and Labor Department together with Jewish residents, students, educators and religious leaders. The federal officials addressed antisemitism in workplaces and schools, as well as the enforcement of hate-crime laws.
Terrell said the tour was created to reach communities that feel ignored or abandoned by local officials and to connect them directly with federal resources.
"We had the FBI at the first tour meeting because some of these cities have failed to prosecute hate crimes," Terrell said, naming Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco, New York and Detroit. He did not identify specific unprosecuted cases.
Terrell said every stop on the tour would include a public event followed by visits to synagogues, Jewish schools and community centers.
"The tour is really two days," he said. "We have a two-hour tour event where the community is invited. You know what we do the next day? I spend the next day, all day in the Jewish community."
The tour comes as Jews remain disproportionately targeted in religiously motivated hate crimes. According to the latest FBI data, law enforcement agencies reported 1,528 single-bias anti-Jewish hate-crime incidents in 2025. The data also showed that 62.4% of victims of religious-bias hate crimes were targeted because of anti-Jewish bias.
Terrell characterized protecting Jewish students and religious communities as a "24-7 obligation," encompassing colleges, K-12 schools and synagogues. He also criticized the financial burden Jewish institutions face to protect students and worshipers, describing security expenses as a "Jewish tax."
Universities remain a major focus of Terrell’s work. He warned university presidents that federal scrutiny would continue if Jewish students remained unprotected, saying potential violations would not disappear with a change in administration.
"All these campus presidents are on notice," he said. "You know what I think they’re trying to do? I think they’re trying to wait out President Trump. It’s not gonna happen."
He added, "Because if they fail to take care of Jewish American students, all students, we’re going back at them, each school, because those are ongoing violations," he said.
"My philosophy is quite simple. Don’t cut deals with these guys," Terrell added. "Force them to go to court, get a court order settlement to make sure they are under the gun to protect Jewish American students."
Asked about professors and those allegedly encouraging harassment, Terrell pointed to what he described as overseas influence on campuses.
"I think, first of all, there’s a lot of money being brought in from overseas to influence the administration, the faculty members and what I call professional harassers," he said.
"The influence of overseas money as it impacts college campuses and really throughout this country to promote antisemitism. Let me tell you right now, that’s being investigated," he said.
His call for broader participation extended to young Christians. Terrell spoke to more than 200 students at the Christian Leaders Summit Forum in Lynchburg, Virginia, hosted by the Combat Antisemitism Movement.
Asked why their participation mattered, Terrell called it "probably the most important meeting I’ve ever had in my job," emphasizing the students’ youth and Christian faith.
"This fight against antisemitism has to include everyone in this country," he said. "Antisemitism is not a Jewish issue. It’s an American issue. It’s a Western civilization issue."
"So I need these young people to join me on the stage, telling the Jewish community, telling all Americans we are together in fighting antisemitism," he added. "Religious freedom must be available to all Americans."
Asked what Jewish Americans who feel abandoned could count on him to deliver, Terrell urged them to seek help.
Authorities in West Texas announced the arrest of 13 suspects, including two Mexican nationals who ran a vehicle theft ring that was being used to supply various terrorist drug cartels. Prosecutors allege the defendants would steal large SUVs and convert
A little more than a year ago, President Donald Trump publicly demanded that Pam Bondi, then the attorney general, find a crime to pin on former FBI Director James Comey. Trump's underlings have repeatedly tried to do that, first charging Comey with lying to Congress and then accusing him of threatening to assassinate the president. But the first indictment was dismissed because Trump had illegally appointed the prosecutor who obtained it, and the second was doomed right out of the gate because it aimed to punish constitutionally protected political speech.
The Justice Department's latest attempt to follow Trump's marching orders was revealed on Monday, when U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden unsealed a "criminal information" that claims Comey illegally shared classified information with The New York Times on October 5, 2016. In an attempt to meet the statutory deadline for that charge, prosecutors filed it exactly 10 years after the alleged disclosure. But Comey's lawyers argue that federal law required the government to obtain a grand jury indictment within 10 years of the alleged offense, which it failed to do.
Whatever you make of that dispute, the president has made it clear that he wants to imprison Comey, a longtime nemesis because of his role in the "Russiagate hoax" during Trump's first term, and does not much care about exactly how that happens. Justice Department officials, meanwhile, are keen to pursue Trump's personal vendetta by using their prosecutorial powers as an instrument of his revenge.
The new case "would almost be funny if it weren't such an appalling abuse of the Department of Justice," Comey said in an online video on Monday. "I'm still innocent. I'm still not afraid of these people, and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary."
In the New York Timesstory at the center of the case, Charlie Savage and Nicole Perloth reported that Yahoo had adapted "a system intended to scan emails for child pornography" to comply with a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court order seeking "messages containing a computer 'signature' tied to the communications of a state-sponsored terrorist organization." Savage and Perloth cited "two government officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity."
Dustin Farahnak, a special U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, says that story included "first-time disclosures of classified information not intended for the public domain." According to Farahnak, the government has evidence that Comey "directed staff" to discuss "specific accuracy concerns" about a prior Reuters report on the same subject with Savage. In the process of doing that, Farahnak says, those FBI officials "illegally transferred classified information."
Comey's attempt to set the record straight, according to Trump's henchmen, was a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison under 18 USC 793(d), an Espionage Act provision that applies to an official who "willfully" shares "information relating to the national defense" with an unauthorized recipient when he "has reason to believe" it "could be used to the injury of the United States." Comey also faces a charge of conspiring to violate Section 793, which likewise carries a maximum 10-year sentence.
If Comey's alleged disclosure was such a grave crime, you might wonder, why did it take a decade to charge him? Because two prior investigations of the same incident concluded that criminal charges were not warranted.
Beginning in March 2017, John Durham, the U.S. attorney for the District of Connecticut, looked into the genesis of the Times article. The investigation found that James Baker, then the FBI's general counsel, was one of the anonymous sources. Baker said he had acted under instructions from FBI Chief of Staff James Rybacki, whom he understood to be conveying Comey's wishes. Durham's investigation included interviews, emails, phone records, and consideration of the relevant statutes. In December 2018, Comey's lawyers note, Durham "wrote a classified memorandum outlining the investigation and recommending 'NO prosecution for Baker or anyone else.'"
The following month, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia "opened an investigation into the same subject matter," Comey's lawyers say. That investigation "was closed without any charges in February 2020" after the office "declined to prosecute."
Given the outcomes of those two investigations, the decision to charge Comey now stinks of desperation to slake Trump's thirst for revenge. According to Comey's lawyers, the tardiness of the charges also fatally undermines the case.
Federal law generally requires that prosecutors file charges within five years of the alleged crime. But the Internal Security Act of 1950 made an exception for Section 793, saying "an indictment for any violation" of that provision "may be found at any time within ten years next after such violation shall have been committed."
The charges against Comey "should be dismissed as time barred," his lawyers argue: "Section 19 of the Internal Security Act gives the government an extended ten-year limitations period in which to charge Section 793 offenses. But as Section 19 unambiguously states, the government may invoke that extended period only by obtaining a grand jury indictment. A criminal information—which the government can issue unilaterally without grand jury involvement—does not suffice. Because the default five-year statute of limitations for federal felonies has long since elapsed on the alleged offenses, and the government's information does not meet the express statutory requirement for an extended ten-year limitations period, the information is untimely and must be dismissed."
Whichever side prevails on that issue, no one should have any illusions that the Justice Department is pursuing the mission suggested by its name. "It remains unclear what [McFadden] will do with the matter and whether DOJ will even be able to secure an indictment—as required by the Constitution," Cato Institute legal fellow Mike Fox says in an emailed press release. "Should the matter proceed, it is unequivocally clear that this case is a vindictive prosecution—a classic case of lawfare by a weaponized Justice Department."
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) reportedly searched a California home tied to its current investigation into former Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.). The Beverly Hills mansion, owned by a donor of Swalwell’s, was searched as part of the probe into the former lawmaker, CNN reported, citing two people familiar with the investigation. “Early this morning…
Este terceiro procedimento contra Comey é aberto após um juiz ter considerado ilegal a demissão da filha do ex-diretor do FBI do seu cargo de procuradora em Nova Iorque.
Former FBI Director James Comey on Monday slammed his new charges from the Trump administration. “Well, they’re back, again. It would almost be funny if it weren’t such an appalling abuse of the Department of Justice, one that we cannot become numb to. Nothing’s changed with me,” Comey said Monday in a video posted to…
The Trump administration is attempting to prosecute former FBI Director James Comey for what it calls disclosing classified information, employing the unusual maneuver of bypassing a grand jury.
James ‘Fergie’ Chambers, in prison in Spain, has applied for asylum as US seeks extradition over alleged Hamas support
US authorities seized wealthy activist James “Fergie” Chambers’s cellphone at some point after Spanish police arrested him in July without notifying him or his attorneys, the Guardian has learned.
Chambers, a US citizen and wealthy donor to leftwing and humanitarian projects, is imprisoned in Madrid. His case is the first known instance of the US seeking to extradite a citizen over alleged support for Hamas, an accusation tied to money Chambers has donated to support Palestinians, including the Sameer Project, in Gaza.
Two former FBI officials are facing charges for lying to Congress about their involvement in the agency’s investigation into Hunter Biden’s laptop. Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides, who worked in the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force (FITF) in 2019 and 2020, were taken into custody Friday, FBI Director Kash Patel said in a post on…
Two former FBI intelligence officials who specialized in foreign election interference were charged Friday with making false statements about their roles in investigating the origins of Hunter Biden's laptop in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election.
Virginia state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, one of the state's most powerful Democrats, was charged on Thursday in connection with what federal authorities alleged was a role leading a wide-ranging criminal enterprise that acquired and distributed large quantities of marijuana and laundered the proceeds.
One of the unfortunate quirks of the American system is that you can't lie to the government, but the government can lie to you. Samuel Tunick found himself on the receiving end of this setup last year at Atlanta International Airport. When agents from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) asked for his phone password, he allegedly gave them a self-destruct code that wiped his data. Tunick now faces five years in prison for destroying evidence.
It turns out that the feds were lying to Tunick the entire time. A new court filing, first reported by 404 Media, shows that the DHS had sent out an order to seize Tunick's phone over his involvement in environmentalist protests in Atlanta. When he landed at the airport, however, agents told Tunick that they were looking for "kiddie porn" and he would be allowed to leave with his phone if he cooperated. They also repeatedly denied him access to his lawyer when he asked.
"There can be no real debate that if law enforcement had acted similarly elsewhere in Atlanta, their actions would be unconstitutional. But the government says it was entitled to act this way because Mr. Tunick was returning from an international vacation" in the Dominican Republic, his lawyers wrote in the filing, which includes internal DHS communications and excerpts from his interrogation video.
U.S. law recognizes a "border exception" to Fourth Amendment privacy rights, allowing federal agents to search incoming travelers for contraband. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) claims that this exemption also allows them to hold travelers for questioning and search their electronic data. Tunick's case reveals just how widely the agency stretches this loophole.
A few hours before Tunick landed, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agent Travis Mcghie emailed the CBP station in Atlanta with his photo and information, stating that he is under investigation for "suspected terrorist activities." (Tunick is involved in Save the Atlanta Forest, also known as Stop Cop City, a protest movement against a local police training center.) The email asked CBP to "conduct a 100% baggage exam, retain all electronics and collect passcodes," stating that the HSI will be at the airport to conduct an interrogation.
Pulled into the secondary screening room, Tunick "almost immediately" told CBP officers that "I don't really want to speak without a lawyer any more," according to the filing, which cites the interrogation tape. He would ask for a lawyer multiple times.
The agents asked Tunick if he had "kiddie porn" on his phone and stated that "because you're refusing to talk, we have the authority to go through your phone to see what we're looking for." One of them, Latoya Castro, told Tunick that "either you can give us your password so that we can go through it no problem, or you can refuse to do that, unfortunately, we will have to seize your phone."
Both of those statements were a lie, of course. The HSI's email had asked CBP to take Tunick's phone, whether or not he cooperated.
The lie about child porn may not only have been meant to intimidate Tunick. While there arecontradictory lower court rulings about the border search exemption, some courts have ruled that the CBP can only search electronics for "digital contraband," or files that are themselves illegal. A search for child sex abuse material would be on stronger legal ground than a search for mere evidence of other crimes.
Tunick was using GrapheneOS, a secure phone system that allows users to set both a real password and a "duress password" that wipes out all data when entered. The interrogation tape shows his phone appearing to reset after he gave the officers a passcode. HSI agent Nathan Burnham and FBI agent Andrea Coble then entered the room.
"You are not under arrest. Once these gentlemen are done with you, pursuant to your entry into the country, you're free to leave," Burnham said, referring to the CBP officers.
Tunick's lawyers argue that the judge should throw out the phone password Tunick provided and everything that resulted from entering it as an "involuntary" response made under "unlawful interrogation," because the CBP agents did not read Tunick his Fifth Amendment rights and ignored his multiple requests to consult with his lawyer before answering their questions.
The CBP claims that secondary screening at the border doesn't count as a criminal investigation, so detainees don't have the same rights as criminal suspects. "Since the international arrivals inspection is an administrative function, CBP policy and federal regs do not permit the presence of lawyers during secondary examinations," a spokesmantoldReason earlier this year.
But Tunick's lawyers insist that his experience was "far outside" a normal border crossing: He was accused of a serious crime to his face, faced an investigation for a different serious crime he didn't know about, and clearly could not leave the situation until he gave information to government agents.
"I hope people understand that the charges against me are meant to intimidate people against protecting their data and their privacy, and the government hopes to set a precedent that no one has the right to privacy," Tunick told 404 Media.
Defend the Atlanta Forest, the movement that Tunick is involved with, has been amajor nuisance for authorities in Georgia. Protesters attacked and burned construction equipment throughout 2022, and police shot a protester in 2023 under unclear circumstances, claiming that they were fired at during a raid.
The Trump administration has brought down the federal government against the movement. In June 2026, the Department of Justice broughtfederal charges against two alleged arsonists, citingNational Security Presidential Memo 7, which directs the feds to go after left-wing domestic terrorism.
But beyond the email line about "suspected terrorist activities," there is no indication of what specific crimes the feds suspected Tunick of, or why they suspected him. And the whole setup of the interrogation was designed to hide those answers. In fact, instead of charging Tunick under typical obstruction or evidence-destruction laws, federal prosecutors chose ararely-used statute that doesn't require them to disclose what the underlying investigation was about.
"Many times the government wants to highlight what it was trying to investigate because that ups the stakes on what the defendant was doing," former prosecutor Daniel RichmantoldThe New York Times. "This is a case where I think they're trying to avoid exactly that by focusing only on the destruction, and not what the investigation was about."
David Kushner first met Anthony Curcio nearly two decades ago, to tell the story of how Curcio masterminded a $400,000 bank robbery and escaped on an inner tube. His latest on Curcio is every bit as outlandish: After his release from federal prison, Curcio waded deep into the trading card industry, dealing in top-rated Michael Jordan and Nolan Ryan cards and coming under scrutiny for suspected fraud. Curcio contends that the real villain is Collectors Holdings, a private company that owns Professional Sports Authenticator, which evaluates and assigns value to trading cards. A thrilling piece of reporting about authenticity—as an idea, a value, and maybe even a front.
Three months later, on the early morning of May 23, 2024, Curcio was walking through his neighborhood in Redmond. It was quiet — what he called “raccoon hours.” Then he heard cars coming up behind him. FBI agents stormed him, guns drawn; he counted around 20. “What the fuck is this about?” he said. “You’re here for sports cards?” He told them about the judgment he’d just won against Captain Ticket. They said they knew all about it.