US President Donald Trump has said he does not want Somali immigrants in the United States, telling reporters that they should “go back to where they came from” and that “their country is no good for a reason.”
“I don’t want you in our country, I’ll be honest with you,” he said during a cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Trump said the United States would be “going down the wrong path if we continue to bring garbage into our country.”
His disparaging comments came as it was reported that immigration authorities were planning a law enforcement operation in Minnesota’s large Somali community.
State officials have condemned the plan, arguing that it could unfairly target American citizens who may appear to be from the East African nation.
Minneapolis and St Paul, which together are known as the Twin Cities, are home to one of the largest Somali communities in the world and the largest in the United States.
In his comments Tuesday, which came at the end of an hour-long televised Cabinet meeting, Trump said, “I don’t want them in our country. I’ll be honest with you, that’s okay. Someone will say, ‘Oh, that’s not politically correct.’ I don’t care. I don’t want them in our country.”
“With Somalia, which is barely a country, you know, they don’t have, they don’t have anything. They just go around killing each other. There’s no structure,” Trump said.
He then went on to criticize Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Democrat and the first Somali-American elected to Congress, whom he has repeatedly clashed with.
“I always watch her,” Trump said, adding that Omar “hates everyone. And I think she’s an incompetent person.”
“His obsession with me is creepy,” Omar said in a social media post. “I hope he gets the help he so desperately needs.”
ReutersThe Trump administration has ordered U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to target undocumented Somali immigrants in the Twin Cities, a person familiar with the planning told BBC U.S. partner CBS News on Tuesday.
Hundreds of people are expected to be attacked when the operation begins this week, the official said. The New York Times first reported on the operation.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, declined to comment on the planned operations and denied that people were targeted based on race.
“Every day, ICE enforces the nation’s laws across the country,” said Deputy Secretary Tricia McLaughlin.
“What makes someone a target for ICE is not their race or ethnicity, but the fact that they are in the country illegally,” he said.
At a news conference, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said an ICE operation “means due process will be violated.”
According to local leaders, about 80,000 people originally from Somalia live there, and the vast majority are American citizens.
The Trump administration has intensified its immigration crackdown in the wake of the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, DC, last week, which killed Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and seriously injured Andrew Wolfe, 24.
The suspect, who has been arrested and charged with murder, is originally from Afghanistan.
Last week, Trump said on social media that he was planning to end Temporary Protected Status — a program for immigrants from countries in crisis — for Somali residents living in Minnesota. A few hundred immigrants would be affected by that order.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also suggested Tuesday that her agency would crack down on visa fraud in Minnesota.
Somalia is one of the poorest nations in the world, and many of the immigrants who moved to the United States left in the 1990s during the country’s decades-long civil war.
Local leaders in Minnesota have condemned the Trump administration’s reported plan.
Minnesota State Senator Zaynab Mohamed said on
Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, who was Kamala Harris’ running mate in the 2024 presidential election and who has been sparring with the president in recent days, said: “We appreciate the support for crime investigation and prosecution. But pulling a PR stunt and indiscriminately attacking immigrants is not a real solution to a problem.”
