Minnesota becomes latest target of Trump’s pressure campaign against Democratic-led states

Minnesota and its Somali immigrant community have become President Donald Trump’s latest target in what has become a pattern of escalating pressure against Democratic-led cities and states across the United States.

The Associated Press, citing a source familiar with the planning, reported Tuesday that ICE would pursue an intensive immigration enforcement operation focused on undocumented members of the Twin Cities Somali community. Teams of immigration agents would spread across the region in what the person described as a directed, high-priority sweep, though the plans remain subject to change

In a shocking statement during a Cabinet meeting Tuesday, Trump explicitly said he did not want Somali immigrants in the U.S., saying residents of the war-ravaged East African country are too reliant on the U.S. social safety net and add little to the nation.

“They contribute nothing. Their country is no good for a reason,” Trump told reporters.

Republican members of Minnesota’s congressional delegation had not responded to requests for comment on Trump’s remarks as of Tuesday evening.

Trump and members of his Cabinet have repeatedly highlighted cases where some members of Minnesota’s Somali-American community defrauded state government programs, citing a recent article by City Journal, which claimed with little evidence that some of the money went to terrorists.

Federal prosecutors say fraudsters stole more than $1 billion from state-run programs in recent years. Most of the several dozen people charged, convicted and sentenced in those schemes are of East African descent, although most are American citizens.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and other leaders held an afternoon news conference to address the mounting tensions in which they lashed out at Trump’s approach and pledged their support for the 80,000-strong Somali community.

In Minneapolis, activists and community leaders traded reports of federal law enforcement activity in the streets — potentially involving immigration — although the nature and scope of any operations was unclear Tuesday.

At a news conference, DFL Gov. Tim Walz said it was clear the administration was turning up the pressure on Minnesota and would “keep piling things on.”

“My expectation is, today, we will probably see an increased presence of immigration folks in our city,” said Walz, who is widely seen as a political foe to the president. “We will probably see the president threaten to use National Guard again. This is a president in spiral doing nothing to make life cheaper for Minnesotans or Americans, and we understand who he’s targeting.”

Walz, the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2024, added that “demonizing an entire population” is not the way to handle concerns about fraud."

Hussein added that Republicans’ efforts to scapegoat them could backfire because Somalis are not a uniform voting bloc and a growing number support the GOP.

“We are deeply concerned this has now materialized into an effort to collectively punish the Somali community,” Hussein said. “It’s a political attack. We believe it is an effort to demonize Muslims.”

In a statement Tuesday, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said “what makes someone a target of ICE is not their race or ethnicity, but the fact that they are in the country illegally.”

“We do not discuss future or potential operations,” she said.

Several other federal agencies have also recently announced plans targeting Minnesota.

Kelly Loeffler, administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration, said in a social media post Tuesday morning that the SBA also will investigate “the network of Somali organizations and executives implicated in these schemes.”

In another salvo fired at Minnesota, U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy called on the Walz administration to revoke nondomiciled commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs) or risk losing as much as $30.4 million in federal highway funding.

The Transportation Department’s threat comes after Duffy said the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration found that one-third of Minnesota’s nondomiciled CDLs were issued illegally. CDLs are required to operate large and heavy vehicles; nondomiciled CDLs are issued to drivers who are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents.

In a statement, Driver and Vehicle Services Director Pong Xiong said earlier this year the agency corrected some administrative errors after an internal audit and planned a further review. It cancelled some ineligible drivers licenses and paused issuing non-domiciled CDLs.

Asked about Duffy’s threat Tuesday, Walz said, “We are following the law exactly as it’s written, exactly as we implemented it for decades.”

There is little evidence to support the claim that stolen taxpayer funds have been funneled to terrorist groups. When the claim was first made by local television news outlet Fox 9 in 2018, Minnesota’s nonpartisan Office of the Legislative Auditor investigated and concluded it couldn’t substantiate the allegation.

Additionally, former U.S. Attorney for Minnesota Andy Luger told the Minnesota Star Tribune last week that the 70 defendants his office prosecuted in the Feeding Our Future fraud case “were looking to get rich, not fund overseas terrorism.”

Walz said Tuesday that he welcomes a federal investigation. But he said his administration has not seen any evidence to support the claim of stolen money going to terrorist groups.

Republicans in the Minnesota Senate also welcomed the federal investigation, saying in a statement Tuesday that it’s “something Governor Walz has never been willing to do himself.”

“Whether fraud was being used for personal enrichment, or being siphoned by terrorist organizations overseas, the reality is that no other state has seen these brazen fraud schemes stealing more than a billion dollars from public funds,” Sens. Jordan Rasmusson, R-Fergus Falls, and Paul Utke, R-Park Rapids, said in the statement.

In Minnesota, Trump used social services fraud as a pretext to end temporary asylum protections for Somalis. His administration is also ending similar protections for roughly 1,000 members of the state’s Karen community, refugees from Myanmar, formerly Burma.

State officials and immigrant rights groups are now waiting to see if the administration’s next move is to try to send in the National Guard.

Julia Decker, policy director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, said the administration routinely uses “whiplash chaos” to instill fear.

“This administration has made no qualms about the fact they are willing to step outside the bounds of the law when it comes to arresting, detaining and even deporting people,” Decker said. “We’ve seen the National Guard pulled out of some places. That sets up this dynamic of where they are going next?”