A California winery co-owned by Rep. Ilhan Omar's husband Tim Mynett filed for termination on April 4, just two months after House Republicans demanded answers about a staggering gap in the congresswoman's financial disclosures, a gap that saw two obscure companies jump from a reported value of $51,000 to as much as $30 million in a single year.
The closure of eStCru, a Santa Rosa-based wine label, caps a troubled run for a business that was once named "hot brand of the year" in 2022 but had already drawn fraud allegations, investor lawsuits, and complaints from winemakers who said they stopped getting paid. When a spokesperson was reached in February, the response was blunt: "the winery is dead."
The timing raises hard questions. Rep. Omar's 2025 financial disclosure had listed the winery's value at between $1 million and $5 million. Then, on March 26, she filed an amended disclosure stating the winery had no value at all, blaming the discrepancy on an "accounting error," the Washington Free Beacon reported. Nine days later, the business filed for termination with the California secretary of state.
That amended disclosure did not quiet the controversy. It deepened it.
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, a Kentucky Republican, laid out the core problem in a February letter to Mynett. Omar's congressional financial disclosures showed that eStCru LLC and Rose Lake Capital LLC, both tied to Mynett, went from being worth as much as $51,000 in 2023 to as much as $30 million in 2024. Comer opened a formal oversight investigation into the discrepancy, calling it a source of "serious public concerns."
In his letter, Comer wrote that the companies had "increased so dramatically in value only a year after reporting very limited assets." He pressed further, as the New York Post reported:
"Given that these companies do not publicly list their investors or where their money comes from, this sudden jump in value raises concerns that unknown individuals may be investing to gain influence with your wife."
That is not a casual accusation. It is the chairman of the House Oversight Committee putting on the record a concern about potential influence-buying through a sitting congresswoman's spouse. And the response from Omar's side has been, in essence, to claim it was all a bookkeeping mistake.
Omar claimed this week that she and Mynett's combined net worth was not tens of millions of dollars after all, that they actually have less than $100,000 combined, the Wall Street Journal reported. Omar spokeswoman Jacklyn Rogers told the Journal: "The amended disclosure confirms what we've said all along: The congresswoman is not a millionaire."
If that is true, it raises its own set of problems. How did an accountant inflate two companies from $51,000 to $30 million? And how did Omar sign a disclosure listing a winery at up to $5 million in value when, by her own later admission, it was worth nothing?
Even before the financial disclosure fight, eStCru had drawn skepticism. The operation was not a traditional brick-and-mortar winery. It was a label that subcontracted producers throughout the West Coast to bottle wines for them. Mynett launched the venture in the fall of 2021, after his prior consulting firm shut down.
By 2022, the brand had earned a "hot brand of the year" designation. But by early 2023, its winemakers said they had stopped getting paid, and the brand was no longer advertising on social media. The House Oversight Committee reportedly began probing the couple's sudden reported wealth surge as the contradictions piled up.
The winery's social media presence told its own story. Its Instagram account was filled with attractive photos of wine and people enjoying the product. But comments from would-be customers painted a different picture entirely.
One commenter on the winery's Facebook page wrote: "Cannot find anywhere to buy their wines. This is weird, like it's not a real winery." Another said: "I want to try a bottle of their fine wine, but I don't know any distributors that sell it." A third was more direct: "No phone number, address is a different business, can't order it because it doesn't exist. Scam."
On Instagram, a commenter asked: "Where can I buy your wine? Oh that's right your winery is as fake as the supposed attack by your employee?"
These are not the reviews of a thriving enterprise. They are the digital footprint of a business that, by multiple accounts, was difficult or impossible for ordinary consumers to patronize, even as it was listed on a congresswoman's financial disclosure at a value in the millions.
The Minnesota Reformer reported in 2024 that the winery had been hit with several fraud allegations and lawsuits from investors. Former employees said they had not been paid. Rose Lake Capital LLC, the investment vehicle tied to Mynett, is also now defunct.
The pattern is worth spelling out plainly. Mynett launched a winery in 2021. It won a brand award in 2022. By early 2023, winemakers said they were not getting paid. By 2024, fraud allegations and investor lawsuits had surfaced. Omar's 2023 disclosure valued the associated companies at up to $51,000. Her 2024 disclosure valued them at up to $30 million. Her 2025 disclosure valued the winery at up to $5 million. Then in March 2026, she amended that disclosure to say it was worth nothing. On April 4, the business filed for termination.
At no point in this timeline does the math hold steady long enough to inspire confidence. Rep. Tom Emmer has put Omar on notice over the financial disclosure gap and vowed full accountability, a sign that the pressure from within Minnesota's own congressional delegation is not going away.
Congressional financial disclosures exist for a simple reason: to let the public see whether elected officials and their spouses have financial entanglements that could compromise their judgment. When a disclosure swings from $51,000 to $30 million and then back down to less than $100,000, the system has either been gamed or treated with reckless disregard.
Blaming an accountant is convenient. But Omar signed these filings. Federal law requires members of Congress to certify the accuracy of their disclosures. An error of this magnitude, tens of millions of dollars, is not a rounding problem. Congressional investigators have opened a broader probe into Omar's finances after a 2024 DOJ inquiry reportedly stalled, suggesting the questions extend well beyond one winery.
Comer's letter flagged the core concern directly: companies that do not publicly list their investors or funding sources experienced a sudden, unexplained leap in reported value, all while connected to the spouse of a sitting member of Congress. That is exactly the kind of arrangement that disclosure laws are designed to expose.
Omar's office has offered shifting explanations. First, the companies were worth up to $30 million. Then the winery was worth up to $5 million. Then it was worth nothing. Then it closed. At each turn, the story changed, but the underlying questions about where the money came from, where it went, and who was involved remain unanswered.
The winery is gone. The capital group is gone. The disclosures have been amended. But the public's right to honest answers from its elected officials does not expire when the business does.
