President Donald Trump has called to immediately end Temporary Protected Status for Somalis in Minnesota following reports of massive fraud and money laundering in the state.
However, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary must implement the legal changes and give appropriate notice to terminate the status. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem visited Minneapolis-St. Paul said on Sunday that ending TPS wouldn’t be immediate.
WATCH: Secretary Noem Press Conference | LIVE in Minneapolis, Minnesota
https://t.co/B3QBeDhmHa— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) November 23, 2025
Trump’s recent order—announced on Friday via Truth Social—stems from numerous fraud allegations in the state, particularly with the Feeding Our Future program. An investigation found the COVID-19 era child nutrition program embezzled hundreds of millions of dollars in COVID-19 relief funds.
“Minnesota, under Governor [Tim] Walz, is a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “I am, as President of the United States, hereby terminating, effective immediately, the Temporary Protected Status (TPS Program) for Somalis in Minnesota.”
The Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, investigated the scheme and tied the embezzled money to the Somali terror group Al-Shabaab, Fox News Digital reported.
“Somali gangs are terrorizing the people of that great State, and BILLIONS of Dollars are missing,” Trump continued. “Send them back to where they came from. It’s OVER! President DJT.”
The Manhattan Institute’s City Journal revealed that billions of taxpayer dollars have been stolen under Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s administration.
The report detailed how “untold millions through a network of ‘hawalas,’ an informal clan-based money-traders, ended up in the pockets of al Qaeda-linked Islamic terror group Al-Shabaab,” The Washington Times reported.
The schemes also involved Minnesota’s Medicaid Housing Stabilization Services program and other organizations.
Federal counterterrorism sources confirmed that millions of dollars in stolen funds were sent back to Somalia, which is how Al-Shabaab got the money, The Washington Times reported.
They “operated a sophisticated financial network from Seattle to Minneapolis and sent massive amounts of money on commercial flights from the Seattle airport to the hawala networks in Somalia,” according to Glenn Kerns, a retired Seattle Police Department detective who spent 14 years on a federal Joint Terrorism Task Force.
So far, 77 people have been charged in connection with the Feeding Our Future scheme, Minnesota Public Radio reported.
The scheme included fake food distribution sites, shell companies and the submission of false claims for meals. The Department of Justice called this network “the largest COVID-19 fraud scheme in the nation.”
Minnesota has the largest Somali population in the nation, with the majority of them living in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.
The TPS program allows certain immigrants, including Somali nationals, temporary legal status to live and work in the U.S. because of war, natural disasters or other dangerous conditions.
“We plan to follow the process that’s in law to evaluate TPS and how it applies to different countries and individuals from them. It was never meant to be an asylum program,” Noem said in the MPR report. “It was always meant to be put in place after an incident or an event on a temporary basis, and that’s what the evaluation will be.”
The number of Somalis covered by TPS is around 705 nationwide based on a report produced for Congress in August, the Associated Press reported.
“There’s no legal mechanism that allows the president to terminate protected status for a particular community or state that he has beef with,” Heidi Altman, policy director at the National Immigrant Justice Center, told the AP.
Michele Garnett McKenzie, executive director of the Advocates for Human Rights, told KMSP FOX 9 that approximately 500 of the 700 with TPS live in Minnesota.
McKenzie said Noem and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services must publish a notice to terminate the TPS designation, and it cannot take effect earlier than 60 days after publication.
Other efforts by the Trump administration to terminate TPS early for other groups have been blocked by the courts, and it seems likely this one will end up in a legal battle as well.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison also took to social media to say, “My office and I are monitoring the situation and exploring all of our options. I am confident that Minnesotans know better than to fall for Donald Trump’s scare tactics and scapegoating.”
If the status is revoked, DHS would have the green light to begin deportation proceedings. Trump’s announcement specifically targeted Somalis in Minnesota, but any program changes would apply nationwide, FOX 9 reported.
The African country of Somali is plagued by armed conflict, violent crime, terrorist attacks and political instability, prompting the TPS designation.
Somalia first received the designation in 1991 after civil war broke out there. The status has been extended more than two dozen times, and the latest extension is set to run through March.
That means the Trump administration has until mid-January to revoke the legal protection for Somalis nationally, per the AP.
The Somalis with TPS status are a relatively small group compared to tens of thousands of Somali Minnesotans who are legal residents, MPR reported.
In September, Immigration officers from USCIS made over 1,000 site visits across the Minneapolis-St. Paul area and found evidence of fraud, non-compliance, or public safety or national security concerns in 275 cases — roughly 44 percent of cases interviewed.
USCIS investigators found evidence of sham marriages, fabricated death certificates and “an alien engaged in marriage fraud by taking advantage of an elderly U.S. citizen spouse, including subjecting the spouse to elder abuse and exploitation,” USCIS said in a press release.
