Dec 2 (Reuters) – Officials in Minneapolis on Tuesday said they were not aware of imminent federal immigration raids targeting the area’s Somali community, which has come under blistering attacks from U.S. President Donald Trump in recent days.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, responding to a report in the New York Times that upward of 100 federal immigration agents were poised to descend on his city and neighboring St. Paul to target undocumented Somali residents, said regardless of whether raids were coming, the Somali community would be supported in every way possible by local authorities.
Frey, a Democrat, said local police would not work with federal agents on any immigration matters, and he strongly criticized Trump’s recent attacks on the Somali community, including on Tuesday when the president called them “garbage” and said “we don’t want them in our country.”
The president has increased his attacks on Somalis in the U.S. since last week’s shooting of two National Guard troops in Washington, a shooting that killed on of the troops and for which an Afghan national has been charged.
“To villainize an entire group is ridiculous under any circumstances,” Frey said.
Anti-immigration rhetoric was a major part of Trump’s campaign and since taking office in January he has overseen an aggressive campaign by masked federal agents across the country that has instilled fear in immigrant communities and prompted protests and backlashes in the cities targeted.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, did not confirm raids were imminent in Minneapolis, but said agents were enforcing immigration laws across the country every day.
About 80,000 Somalis live in Minnesota, mostly in the Twin Cities metro region. Frey said the community had been an economic and cultural boon to the area and had been living in the U.S. for several decades. The vast majority of Somalis in the U.S., Frey said, are American citizens, and he said he’s convinced any immigration action would ensnare people in the country legally.
LATEST ATTACKS
Trump last month said he was immediately terminating temporary deportation protections for Somalis living in Minnesota, saying “Somali gangs” were terrorizing the state, without offering evidence or details. Local officials said Trump’s portrayal is untrue. In all, 705 Somalis are in the country with TPS status, according to government records.
During a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Trump ratcheted up his inflammatory rhetoric about Somalis, saying they had contributed nothing to the U.S.
“I don’t want them in our country, I’ll be honest with you,” Trump said. “Their country is no good for a reason. Their country stinks.”
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said the president was “absolutely right to highlight the problems caused by the radical Somali migrants that the Democrats let invade our country and steal from American taxpayers.”
Trump has long used incendiary rhetoric, as well as racist and sexist language, saying on several occasions that immigrants in the U.S. illegally are “poisoning the blood of our country.”
St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter, the first Black mayor of his Twin City which is also home to many Somalis, said Trump’s attacks on that community were “racist” and “xenophobic.”
Citing the opening words to the preamble of the U.S. Constitution – “We the People” – as the phrase that launched the American experience, Carter said “the sacred moments in American history are the moments we’ve had to decide who the ‘we’ is, who is included.’
“Who (Trump) is attacking aren’t just Somalis – they are Somali-Americans,” Carter said. “Who he attacked is Americans.”
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Colorado; Additional reporting by Ted Hesson, Trevor Hunnicutt and Andrea Shalal in Washington; editing by Donna Bryson and Lincoln Feast)
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