(This story contains language some readers may find offensive)
By Heather Schlitz
MINNEAPOLIS, Dec 5 (Reuters) – Crowds usually press shoulder-to-shoulder at Karmel Mall, a sprawling Somali shopping center in Minneapolis, where people often greet each other by name, speak Somali more than English and gather to browse for new hijabs and shop from hundreds of vendors lining the narrow hallways.
On Wednesday night, however, only a handful of people milled around the mall after U.S. President Donald Trump called Somali immigrants “garbage” and said that “they destroyed our country.” City officials say his remarks coincided with a surge of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Minneapolis.
Minnesota’s Somali community has become an increasingly influential political constituency in the state, with U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar its most high-profile member.
As a fraud investigation churns up convictions of community members, Trump has focused his ire on Omar and other Somalis. A stepped-up deportation campaign in the Twin Cities that began this week has forced some Somali residents into hiding and others to become hypervigilant, often carrying their passports with them out of fear of racial profiling by ICE officers, according to interviews with residents, local officials and immigrant advocates.
‘WE’RE NOT TRASH’
“I don’t even feel myself because I’m scared everywhere I go. Am I a target? I don’t even know. That’s very sad,” said Ifrah Farah, a U.S. citizen from Somalia and the owner of a hair salon in Karmel Mall.
“I never did anything wrong; I’m a hard-working mom. We’re not trash,” she said. Jamal Osman, a Minneapolis city council member and Somali refugee who immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager, said he’s been deluged with calls from constituents asking if it’s safe to venture outside and to get updates on ICE activity, noting that the community now feels like a “war zone.”
“What makes someone a target of ICE is not their race or ethnicity, but the fact that they are in the country illegally. Those who are not here illegally and are not breaking other laws have nothing to fear,” said Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security.
Still, the community has faced fresh scrutiny in recent weeks amid a sweeping fraud investigation by the Justice Department. At least 77 people have been charged, many from the Somali community, with siphoning COVID relief funds that were intended to provide meals to schoolchildren. At least 56 of those charged have pleaded guilty, and a white Minnesota woman, alleged to be the group’s ringleader, was convicted on four counts of wire fraud.
DEPORTATION SURGE
McLaughlin confirmed that a deportation surge started earlier this week, with immigrant advocates and city leaders saying agents have apprehended residents on the streets, in cars and outside homes in Cedar-Riverside, the neighborhood that’s home to much of Minneapolis’ Somali community. Reuters has also witnessed detentions of Spanish-speaking day laborers. Immigrant rights advocates said the president is using the fraud investigation as an excuse to target the community more broadly, while Michelle Rivero, director of the Minneapolis Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs, said the Somali community is a driver of the city’s economic and social life.
Tensions in the community rose on Tuesday when Trump made derogatory remarks about Somalis during a televised cabinet meeting. He doubled down Wednesday in comments to reporters in the Oval Office. In an interview with Reuters later on Wednesday, Omar slammed Trump’s comments as racist, Islamophobic and xenophobic. “It’s not surprising to me, but what is weird to me is just how creepy he’s been. He’s obsessed with me and the Somali community,” she said.
Over half of Minneapolis’ 84,000 Somalis were born in the U.S., and the vast majority are legal residents, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Most Somalis born outside the U.S. came as refugees from Somalia’s brutal, decades-long civil war, which resulted in an exodus of more than a million people starting in 1991. The U.S. began issuing visas to Somali refugees in 1992.
Many settled in Minnesota, drawn by refugee support groups, Minnesotans’ welcoming reputation and social ties. Karmel Mall is a gathering place for Somalis, humming with conversation, Arabic music, and the call to prayer – its air scented with cardamom, cinnamon, and coriander from traditional cooking as friends sip hot spiced tea.
“It’s a sweet home,” said Hayat, a Somali immigrant and the owner of a clothing shop in the mall that is stocked almost to the ceiling with glittering hijabs, jewel-colored dresses and imported perfumes. She asked only to be identified by her first name out of fear of retaliation from ICE.
Hayat said she lost 90% of her customers in recent days, as community members stay home out of fear.
Somali women – usually dressed in flowing abayas, trendy headscarves and gold jewelry – run most of the businesses in the mall and said their businesses have been devastated by the ICE surge and the president’s words.
“This is not public safety,” said St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter, calling the immigration raids a “carnival” that does not make the community safer.
Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Minnesota, said on Wednesday that Trump’s attacks on Somali Americans and immigrants were dangerous, and had provoked an increase in online threats against the community.
“We know what fear feels like. We went through a civil war and came here. We’re not going to let this disturb us,” Osman said. “The fear is real in our community. They are being targeted by the President of the United States.”
(Reporting by Heather Schlitz; Additional reporting by Julia Harte in New York, Andy Sullivan in Washington, and Eric Cox in Minneapolis; Editing by Emily Schmall and Diane Craft)
