Trump Ends Deportation Protections for Minnesota Somalis

President Trump announced Friday night that he is ending Temporary Protected Status for Somalis in Democrat-run Minnesota, following a report published in the City Journal that revealed large-scale welfare fraud tied to parts of Minnesota's Somali community that funneled money overseas, including to a terrorist organization.

"Minnesota, under Governor Waltz, is a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

He continued, "I am, as President of the United States, hereby terminating, effective immediately, the Temporary Protected Status (TPS Program) for Somalis in Minnesota. Somali gangs are terrorizing the people of that great State, and BILLIONS of Dollars are missing. Send them back to where they came from. It's OVER! President DJT."

Investigative journalists Ryan Thorpe and Christopher F. Rufo's report in the City Journal revealed that billions in taxpayer funds were stolen through Medicaid programs, childcare-meal reimbursements, and autism-services schemes by Minnesota's Somali community. These funds then ultimately ended up in the hands of the terror group Al-Shabaab.

"This is a third-rail conversation, but the largest funder of Al-Shabaab is the Minnesota taxpayer," a source told the journalists, adding, "There is an issue here that is real, and if there is ever an event that is traceable back to these funds, or to people from this area, then this situation will take on a whole new set of optics."

Rufo's report has unleashed a massive burst of nationwide media attention on the corruption over the last several days. This suggests that much greater reforms are coming, likely in the name of national security (cc Rubio). It's also possible that the Manhattan Institute already has an executive-order framework queued up for the White House.

Meanwhile, Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota is furious with the Trump administration. She wrote on X:

I am a citizen and so are majority of Somalis in America. Good luck celebrating a policy change that really doesn't have much impact on the Somalis you love to hate. We are here to stay.

"It's not surprising that the President has chosen to broadly target an entire community. This is what he does to change the subject," Gov. Tim Walz wrote on X. Like many Democrats pushing back on Trump, Walz notably failed to mention Rufo's report.