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President Donald Trump called a bloc of Somali migrants to Minnesota “garbage” who rely too heavily on the U.S. welfare state, as ICE reportedly eyes ramped-up immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities.
Speaking at his ninth Cabinet meeting of 2025 on Tuesday, Trump said that Somalis have made a mess of Minneapolis-St. Paul, and characterized Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., as their political figurehead.
His comments come as a New York Times report claimed ICE is prepared to launch an “intensive immigration enforcement operation” targeting the Twin Cities. The paper claimed it would target the Somali population, but a top DHS official told Digital the agency never prosecutes based on race – only immigration status.
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President Donald Trump, left; Rep. Ilhan A. Omar, right. (Pete Marovich/Getty Images; Tom Williams/Getty Images)
At the White House, Trump lambasted Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz over a burgeoning scandal in St. Paul over what the Times said were “several fraud schemes proliferated in parts of Minnesota’s Somali community.”
According to the report, multiple individuals allegedly created companies that billed the state for millions in fraudulent payments.
“Walz is a grossly incompetent man; there’s something wrong with him,” Trump said of the Box Butte, Nebraska native who was also Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate.
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Walz defended himself to The New York Times, saying the programs under scrutiny “are set up to move money to people.”
“The programs are set up to improve people’s lives, and in many cases, the criminals find the loopholes,” he said.
Trump, meanwhile, said Somalia “is barely a country, where they run around killing each other.”
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“Ilhan Omar is garbage – her friends are garbage,” he said.
“When they come from hell, and they complain and do nothing but bitch — we don’t want them in our country. Let ’em go back to where they came from and fix it,” he said.
Trump also revisited allegations that Omar, who is from Mogadishu, allegedly “married her brother” to obtain U.S. citizenship.
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After her 2016 Democratic State House primary upset that launched her political career, Omar told Minnesota Public Radio that she married Ahmed Hirsi – with whom she has three children – but is also separated from a second man who lives in England.
A conservative blog at the time claimed Omar was simultaneously married to Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, and claimed the man could also be her brother – but the congresswoman called such claims “absurd and offensive.”
In 2020, Omar married political consultant Tim Mynett, and wrote on Instagram that she had gone from “partners in politics to partners in life – so blessed. Alhamdulillah.”
Of claims ICE is going to target Somalis in the Twin Cities, Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin dismissed such claims:
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“Every day, ICE enforces the laws of the nation across the country. 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.
In response to Trump, Omar said the president’s “obsession with me is creepy.”
“I hope he gets the help he desperately needs,” she said on X.
