Omar cuts financial ties with consulting firm co-owned by her husband after months of scrutiny

U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar on Sunday announced she has severed financial ties with a political consulting firm co-owned by her husband that received $2.78 million from Omar’s campaign account over a 15-month period starting in July 2019.

The financial arrangement has drawn scrutiny. According to Federal Election Commission reports, Omar’s campaign has made 140 payments to E Street Group for services including digital advertising, fundraising consulting and mail production and postage. 

In a post-election update emailed to supporters, Omar, who handily won her re-election, praised the work of her husband Tim Mynett’s firm, E Street Group. She also suggested that the onslaught of spending in her primary race and the general election are reasons why she did not cut ties sooner with the firm, whose co-owner is Will Hailer, a former staffer to Attorney General Keith Ellison.

“While many of our close supporters know these two well and have recommended we keep them on — I want to make sure that anybody who is supporting our campaign with their time or financial support feels there is no perceived issue with that support,” she wrote.

Omar announced she married Mynett in March, posting her nuptials on Instagram during President Trump’s primetime address on the COVID-19 pandemic.  

“Because of Will and Tim’s decades of combined knowledge and experience in the (5th District), and the work they had done to prepare us for re-election — where our primary and general opponents spent a record-setting $14 million against us — we couldn’t part ways with this team after we got married,” she wrote recently.

She briefly commented on her marriage, saying she and Mynett “found true happiness together.”

She added: “And while I won’t comment more on our personal life than that, I can assure you that every interaction our campaign had with the folks on his team, were allowed under federal law.”