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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   18446 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 29, 2024

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Man, I thought the immigration fraud argument was stupid when it came up years ago, and I think it’s stupid now. Are you the same guy who brought it up on Reddit? Because I’m pretty sure you’re citing the exact same tabloid. Do you have anything more credible?

  • -16

Why do you think it's stupid? Do you think it's simply not true? Or that it is true but doesn't matter? Or that she should have been able to bring her brother over at any time, so she was justified? What? Because I'm fairly certain it's true, and no, I don't have anything that could be cited on wikipedia to mollify you. Just local reporters that have dug around, which is where the story first got legs, and rumors in the Somalis in Minnesota.

Fill me in as a bystander, please. I am not adversarial to this point of view. In fact, I despise Ilhan Omar and would like the claim to be true because it's politically damaging to an adversary and hilarious. I just haven't actually seen any evidence that meets a remotely stringent standard of epistemology. Is there better evidence than it sounding plausible, being damaging to an adversary, and hilarious?

If you'll forgive links to PoliFact and the Daily Mail, I think these give a rough overview of the information involved.

https://www.politifact.com/article/2019/jul/18/did-ilhan-omar-marry-her-brother-her-hometown-news/

Basically she married Hirsi, divorced him, married Elmi but kept filing taxes with Hirsi, divorced Elmi and remarried Hirsi (she later divorced Hirsi and married a staffer of hers but I don't think it's relevant here, other than perhaps revealing she doesn't shy away from divorce).

I think the evidence does look like something shady went on with her marriage to Elmi, which may have been around getting him into the US so he could go to school. Though I note he was a British citizen and getting an F-1 visa is pretty straightforward as a British citizen in my direct experience. No evidence here that he is her brother however.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9891015/Claims-DNA-match-proves-Ilhan-Omar-married-brother.html

Here we have a claim that a Republican activist compared DNA from a cigarette claimed to have been smoked by Omar with DNA from a straw claimed to have been used by Elmi and that it showed a genetic match. However we have only their word that was the case, and they could have simply submitted DNA from any two siblings, as of course the lab wasn't present at the collection. Taking advantage of a pre-existing rumour to manufacture evidence? Or a true fact?

Apparently social media posts may lend credence to the idea Elmi is gay, which may speak to being part of an immigration scam marriage, but then again he is also apparently living back in the UK.

If I were pressed, given my knowledge of Islamic family practices, I might think Elmi was likely a cousin or close family friend. It's not unknown for marriages to cover for gay men in general, so I suspect their marriage wasn't "real". The DNA test is I think hopelessly tainted, so whether he is actually her brother is up in the air. Though it's possible someone with more knowledge of DNA tests might be able to see something those in the results that is dispositive.

I don't really believe you have any firsthand knowledge of Somali rumors.

Of course I don't. It's second and thirdhand.

I also don't have firsthand knowledge from the local reporters, because I'm not local.

That it’s not true. I spent some time trying to dig up my response from the last time it came up, but had no luck. Reddit’s search tools have only gotten worse.

I believe my argument boiled down to “why does this cigarette have so much credibility?”

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