The Trump Administration is revoking the legal status of several thousand immigrants from Somalia, raising the specter of deportation for a community often assailed by the president, especially in Minnesota over the last few weeks.
The Department of Homeland Security official saying Tuesday morning that Somalia's Temporary Protected Status program, which allows beneficiaries to live and work in the U.S. without fear of deportation, will end on March 17.
Nationals of Somalia enrolled in the TPS program are now set to lose their legal status and work permits, effecting roughly 2,500 immigrants living and working here, up until this point legally, in the U.S.
There are an estimated 500 of them in Minnesota where the Department of Homeland Security sent more than 2,000 immigration officers into, in what Immigration and Customs Enforcement has called its largest enforcement operation ever.
President Donald Trump has linked his administration’s immigration crackdown against Minnesota’s large Somali community to a series of fraud cases involving government programs in which many defendants have roots in the east African country.
Trump last month labeled Minnesota Somalis as “garbage” and said he didn’t want them in the U.S.
Minnesota State Rep. Michael Howard (DFL) who represents Richfield where a significant population of Somali's live, told WCCO's Adam Carter the announcement is part of a pattern from the Trump Administration to attack the state, and people of color.
"Really the point here is the cruelty," Rep. Howard said. "This status in terms of the numbers of folks impacted in a global sense, not a large number, still incredibly impactful. And we're working to gather as much information as we can about how to support both Minnesotans, and how to address this. But, it's unfortunately just part of the pattern of what this federal government is doing to try to divide and conquer."
The state, joined by Minneapolis and St. Paul, sued the Trump administration Monday to try to halt or limit the surge.
The TPS program for refugees from Somalia has been in place since 1991 and renewed by both Democratic and Republican administrations.
Minnesota has the largest Somali population in the U.S. About 84,000 of the 260,000 Somalis in the U.S. live in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. The overwhelming majority are American citizens. Almost 58% were born in the U.S and 87% of the foreign-born are naturalized citizens.