Trump Says He Doesn’t Want Somalis in US as ICE Plans Minnesota Operation
MINNEAPOLIS — December 3, 2025. Federal authorities are preparing a sweeping immigration-enforcement operation in Minnesota targeting Somali immigrants, following recent remarks by Donald J. Trump declaring his opposition to Somali residency in the United States.
According to officials familiar with the planning, the operation — to be carried out by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — will focus on the Twin Cities area of Minneapolis–St. Paul and aim at individuals with final deportation orders. Sources say hundreds could be targeted as part of what has been described as a “high-priority sweep.”
Trump, speaking at a Cabinet meeting earlier this week, said his administration does not want immigrants from Somalia in the country, stating that many contribute little and rely heavily on social support. “I don’t want them in our country,” he said.
Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis condemned the remarks and expressed concern over what he called a racially targeted immigration crackdown. He stressed that the city would not cooperate with federal agents in civil-immigration enforcement and urged Somali residents to remain calm and seek legal support.
Minnesota is home to the largest Somali community in the United States, with many individuals now U.S. citizens. Community leaders warned that the planned operation and hostile rhetoric risk stirring fear, eroding trust, and increasing the danger of wrongful detentions — including of U.S. citizens.
The unfolding developments mark another chapter in a deeply polarized national debate over immigration and refugee policy, as critics argue the moves target a vulnerable ethnic group, while supporters frame them as enforcement of immigration laws.
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 US.
In his comments on Tuesday, which came at the end of an hours-long televised cabinet meeting, Trump said: “I don’t want them in our country. I’ll be honest with you, OK. Somebody 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 have no, they have no anything. They just run around killing each other. There’s no structure,” Trump said.
He then turned to criticising Representative Ilhan Omar, a Democrat and the first Somali-American to be elected to Congress who he has clashed with repeatedly.
“I always watch her,” Trump said, adding that Omar “hates everybody. 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 desperately needs.”
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been directed by the Trump administration to target undocumented Somali immigrants in the Twin Cities, a person familiar with the planning told the BBC’s US partner CBS News on Tuesday.
Hundreds of people are expected to be targeted when the operation begins this week, the official said. The New York Times first reported the operation.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, declined to comment on planned operations and denied that any people would be targeted based on race.
“Every day, ICE enforces the laws of the nation across the country,” said Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin.
“What makes someone a target of ICE is not their race or ethnicity, but the fact that they are in the country illegally,” she said.
In a news conference, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said that an operation by ICE “means due process will be violated”.
According to local leaders, there are about 80,000 people living there who are originally from Somalia, 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 on ending the Temporary Protected Status – a programme 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 on Tuesday her agency would target visa fraud in Minnesota.
Somalia is one of the poorest nations in the world, and many of the migrants who moved to the US 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 X that “when ICE agents interact with Somalis here, they will find what we’ve been saying for years: Almost all of us are US citizens”.
Democratic Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, who was Kamala Harris’s running mate in the 2024 presidential election and who has been sparring with the president in recent days, said: “We welcome support in investigating and prosecuting crime. But pulling a PR stunt and indiscriminately targeting immigrants is not a real solution to a problem.”
