federal officer

MINNEAPOLIS — The mayor of Minneapolis said Sunday that sending active-duty soldiers into Minnesota to help with an immigration crackdown is a ridiculous and unconstitutional idea as he urged protesters to remain peaceful so the president won’t see a need to send in the U.S. military.

Daily protests have been ongoing throughout January since the Department of Homeland Security ramped up immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul by bringing in more than 2,000 federal officers.

In a diverse neighborhood where Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers have been frequently seen, U.S. postal workers marched through on Sunday, chanting: “Protect our routes. Get ICE out.”

The Pentagon has ordered about 1,500 active-duty soldiers based in Alaska who specialize in operating in arctic conditions to be ready in case of a possible deployment to Minnesota, two Defense officials said Sunday.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military plans, said two infantry battalions of the Army’s 11th Airborne Division have been given prepare-to-deploy orders.

One Pentagon official said the troops are standing by to deploy to Minnesota should President Trump invoke the Insurrection Act, as he has threatened.

The rarely used 19th century law would allow him to send military troops into Minnesota, where protesters have been confronting federal immigration agents for weeks. He has since backed off the threat, at least for now.

“It’s ridiculous, but we will not be intimidated by the actions of this federal government,” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “It is not fair, it’s not just, and it’s completely unconstitutional.”

Thousands of Minneapolis citizens are exercising their 1st Amendment rights and the protests have been overwhelmingly peaceful, Frey said.

“We are not going to take the bait. We will not counter Donald Trump’s chaos with our own brand of chaos here,” Frey said.

Gov. Tim Walz has mobilized the Minnesota National Guard, although no units have been deployed to the streets.

Peter Noble joined dozens of other U.S. Postal Service workers Sunday on their only day off from their mail routes to march against the immigration crackdown. They passed by the place where an immigration officer shot and killed Renee Nicole Good, a U.S. citizen and mother of three, during a Jan. 7 confrontation.

“I’ve seen them driving recklessly around the streets while I am on my route, putting lives in danger,” Noble said.

Letter carrier Susan Becker said she came out to march on the coldest day since the crackdown started because it’s important to keep telling the federal government she thinks what it is doing is wrong. She said people on her route have reported ICE breaking into apartment buildings and tackling people in the parking lots of shopping centers.

“These people are by and large citizens and immigrants. But they’re citizens, and they deserve to be here; they’ve earned their place and they are good people,” Becker said.

A Republican U.S. House member from Minnesota called for Walz to tone down his comments about fighting the federal government and help the federal law enforcement efforts.

Many of the ICE officers in Minnesota are neighbors just doing the jobs they were sent to do, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer told WCCO-AM in Minneapolis.

“These are not mean-spirited people. But right now, they feel like they’re under attack. They don’t know where the next attack is going to come from and who it is. So people need to keep in mind this starts at the top,” Emmer said.

Across social media, videos have been posted of federal officers spraying protesters with pepper spray, knocking down doors and forcibly taking people into custody. On Friday, a federal judge ruled that immigration officers can’t detain or tear-gas peaceful protesters who aren’t obstructing authorities, including when they’re observing the officers during the Minnesota crackdown.

Brook writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Konstantin Toropin in Washington, Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations and Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, S.C., contributed to this report.

MINNEAPOLIS — Hundreds of counterprotesters drowned out a far-right activist’s attempt to hold a small rally Saturday in support of the Trump administration’s massive immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, as the governor’s office announced that National Guard troops were mobilized and ready to assist law enforcement though not yet deployed to city streets.

There have been protests every day since the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ramped up immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul by bringing in more than 2,000 federal officers.

Conservative influencer Jake Lang, who was among the Jan. 6 rioters pardoned by President Trump, organized an anti-Islam, anti-Somali and pro-ICE demonstration, saying on social media beforehand that he intended to “burn a Quran” on the steps of City Hall. It was not clear whether he carried out that plan.

Only a small number of people showed up for Lang’s demonstration, while hundreds of counterprotesters converged at the site, yelling over his attempts to speak and chasing the pro-ICE group away. They forced at least one person to take off a shirt they deemed objectionable.

Lang appeared to be injured as he left the scene, with bruises and scrapes on his head.

Lang was previously charged with assaulting an officer with a baseball bat, civil disorder and other crimes, serving four years in jail while awaiting trial, until Trump pardoned him last Jan. 20 along with other Jan. 6 defendants and convicts. Lang recently announced he is running for U.S. Senate in Florida.

In Minneapolis, snowballs and water balloons were also thrown before an armored police van and heavily equipped city police arrived.

“We’re out here to show Nazis and ICE and DHS and MAGA you are not welcome in Minneapolis,” protester Luke Rimington said. “Stay out of our city, stay out of our state. Go home.”

National Guard ‘staged and ready’

The state National Guard said in a statement that it had been “mobilized” by Democratic Gov. Tim Walz to support the Minnesota State Patrol “to assist in providing traffic support to protect life, preserve property, and support the rights of all Minnesotans to assemble peacefully.”

Maj. Andrea Tsuchiya, a spokesperson for the Guard, said it was “staged and ready” but yet to be deployed.

The announcement came more than a week after Walz, a frequent critic and target of Trump, told the Guard to be ready to support law enforcement in the state.

During the daily protests, demonstrators have railed against masked immigration officers pulling people from homes and cars and using other aggressive tactics. The operation in the liberal Twin Cities has claimed at least one life: Renee Nicole Good, a U.S. citizen and mother of three, who was shot by an ICE officer during a Jan. 7 confrontation.

On Friday a federal judge ruled that immigration officers cannot detain or tear-gas peaceful protesters who are not obstructing authorities, including while observing officers during the Minnesota crackdown.

Living in fear

During a news conference Saturday, a man who fled civil war in Liberia as a child said he has been afraid to leave his Minneapolis home since being released from an immigration detention center following his arrest last weekend.

Video of federal officers breaking down Garrison Gibson’s front door with a battering ram Jan. 11 become another rallying point for protesters who oppose the crackdown.

Gibson, 38, was ordered to be deported, apparently because of a 2008 drug conviction that was later dismissed. He has remained in the country legally under what’s known as an order of supervision. After his recent arrest, a judge ruled that federal officials did not give him enough notice that his supervision status had been revoked.

Then Gibson was taken back into custody for several hours Friday when he made a routine check-in with immigration officials. Gibson’s cousin Abena Abraham said Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials told her that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller ordered the second arrest.

The White House denied the account of the rearrest and that Miller had anything to do with it.

Gibson was flown to a Texas immigration detention facility but returned home following the judge’s ruling. His family used a dumbbell to keep their damaged front door closed amid subfreezing temperatures before spending $700 to fix it.

“I don’t leave the house,” Gibson said at a news conference.

DHS said an “activist judge” was again trying to stop the deportation of “criminal illegal aliens.”

“We will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of aliens who have no right to be in this country,” Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said.

Gibson said he has done everything he was supposed to do: “If I was a violent person, I would not have been out these past 17 years, checking in.”

Brook writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis, Josh Boak in West Palm Beach, Fla., and Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, S.C., contributed to this report.

MINNEAPOLIS — Federal officers in the Minneapolis area participating in the largest recent U.S. immigration enforcement operation can’t detain or tear-gas peaceful protesters who aren’t obstructing authorities, including when these people are observing the agents, a judge in Minnesota ruled Friday.

U.S. District Judge Kate Menendez’s ruling addresses a case filed in December on behalf of six Minnesota activists. They are among the thousands who have been observing the activities of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol officers enforcing the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area since last month.

Federal agents and demonstrators repeatedly have clashed since the crackdown began. The confrontations escalated after an immigration agent fatally shot Renee Nicole Good in the head on Jan. 7 as she drove away, a killing captured on video. Agents have arrested or briefly detained many people in the Twin Cities crackdown.

The activists in the case are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota, which says government officers are violating the constitutional rights of Twin Cities residents.

After the ruling, Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin issued a statement saying her agency was taking “appropriate and constitutional measures to uphold the rule of law and protect our officers and the public from dangerous rioters.”

She said people assaulted officers, vandalized their vehicles and federal property, and attempted to impede officers from doing their work.

“We remind the public that rioting is dangerous — obstructing law enforcement is a federal crime and assaulting law enforcement is a felony,” McLaughlin said.

The ACLU didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment Friday night.

The ruling prohibits the officers from detaining drivers and passengers in vehicles when there is no reasonable suspicion they are obstructing or interfering with the officers. Safely following agents “at an appropriate distance does not, by itself, create reasonable suspicion to justify a vehicle stop,” the ruling said.

Menendez said the agents would not be allowed to arrest people without probable cause or reasonable suspicion the person has committed a crime or was obstructing or interfering with the activities of officers.

Menendez also is presiding over a lawsuit filed Monday by the state of Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul seeking to suspend the federal enforcement crackdown, and some of the legal issues are similar. She declined at a hearing Wednesday to grant the state’s request for an immediate temporary restraining order in that case.

“What we need most of all right now is a pause. The temperature needs to be lowered,” state Assistant Atty. Gen. Brian Carter told her.

Menendez said the issues raised by the state and cities in that case are “enormously important.” But she said it raises high-level constitutional and other legal issues, and for some of those issues there are few on-point precedents. So she ordered both sides to file more briefs next week.

McAvoy and Karnowski write for the Associated Press and reported from Honolulu and Minneapolis, respectively. AP writer Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed to this report.

MINNEAPOLIS — President Trump on Thursday threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act and deploy troops to quell persistent protests against the federal officers sent to Minneapolis to enforce his administration’s massive immigration crackdown.

The president’s threat comes a day after a federal immigration officer shot and wounded a Minneapolis man who had attacked the officer with a shovel and broom handle. That shooting further heightened the fear and anger radiating across the Minnesota city since an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent fatally shot a Renee Good in the head.

Trump has repeatedly threatened to invoke the rarely used federal law to deploy the U.S. military or federalize the National Guard for domestic law enforcement, over the objections of state governors.

“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT, which many Presidents have done before me, and quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place in that once great State,” Trump said in social media post.

The Associated Press has reached out to the offices of Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey for comment.

The Department of Homeland Security says it has made more than 2,000 arrests in the state since early December and is vowing to not back down. ICE is a DHS agency.

Protests, tear gas and another shooting

In Minneapolis, smoke filled the streets Wednesday night near the site of the latest shooting as federal officers wearing gas masks and helmets fired tear gas into a small crowd. Protesters responded by throwing rocks and shooting fireworks.

Police Chief Brian O’Hara said during a news conference that the gathering was an unlawful assembly and “people need to leave.”

Things later quietened down and by early Thursday only a few demonstrators and law enforcement officers remained at the scene.

Demonstrations have become common on the streets of Minneapolis since the ICE agent fatally shot 37-year-old Good on Jan. 7. Agents have yanked people from their cars and homes, and have been confronted by angry bystanders demanding that the officers pack up and leave.

“This is an impossible situation that our city is presently being put in and at the same time we are trying to find a way forward to keep people safe, to protect our neighbors, to maintain order,” Frey, the mayor, said.

Frey said the federal force — five times the size of the city’s 600-officer police force — has “invaded” Minneapolis, scaring and angering residents.

Shooting followed a chase

In a statement describing the events that led to Wednesday’s shooting, Homeland Security said federal law enforcement officers stopped a driver from Venezuela who is in the U.S. illegally. The person drove away and crashed into a parked car before taking off on foot, DHS said.

After officers reached the person, two other people arrived from a nearby apartment and all three started attacking the officer, according to DHS.

“Fearing for his life and safety as he was being ambushed by three individuals, the officer fired a defensive shot to defend his life,” DHS said.

The two people who came out of the apartment are in custody, it said.

O’Hara said the man shot was in the hospital with a non-life-threatening injury.

The shooting took place about 4.5 miles ( north of where Good was killed. O’Hara’s account of what happened largely echoed that of Homeland Security.

During a speech before the latest shooting, Walz described Minnesota as being in chaos, saying what’s happening in the state “defies belief.”

“Let’s be very, very clear, this long ago stopped being a matter of immigration enforcement,” he said. “Instead, it’s a campaign of organized brutality against the people of Minnesota by our own federal government.”

An official says the agent who killed Good was injured

Jonathan Ross, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who killed Good, suffered internal bleeding to his torso during the encounter, a Homeland Security official told The Associated Press.

The official spoke to AP on condition of anonymity in order to discuss Ross’ medical condition. The official did not provide details about the severity of the injuries, and the agency did not respond to questions about the extent of the bleeding, exactly how he suffered the injury, when it was diagnosed or his medical treatment.

Good was killed after three ICE officers surrounded her SUV on a snowy street a few blocks from her home.

Bystander video shows one officer ordering Good to open the door and grabbing the handle. As the vehicle begins to move forward, Ross, standing in front, raises his weapon and fires at least three shots at close range. He steps back as the SUV advances and turns.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has said Ross was struck by the vehicle and that Good was using her SUV as a weapon — a self-defense claim that has been criticized by Minnesota officials.

Chris Madel, an attorney for Ross, declined to comment.

Good’s family has hired the same law firm that represented George Floyd’s family in a $27 million settlement with Minneapolis. Floyd, who was Black, died after a white police officer pinned his neck to the ground in the street in May 2020.

Karnowski, Richer, Golden and Madhani write for the Associated Press. Madhani reported from Washington. AP reporters Bill Barrow in Atlanta; Julie Watson in San Diego; Rebecca Santana in Washington; Ed White in Detroit and Giovanna Dell’Orto in Minneapolis contributed to this report.

Before Minneapolis was left to mourn the death of Renee Good, there was George Floyd.

Same town, same sorrow, same questions — what becomes of society when you can’t trust the authorities? What do you do when the people tasked with upholding the law break the rules, lie and even kill?

California is pushing to answer that question, with laws and legislation meant to combat what is increasingly a rogue federal police force that is seemingly acting, too often violently, without restraint. That’s putting it in the most neutral, least inflammatory terms.

“California has a solemn responsibility to lead and to use every lever of power that we have to protect our residents, to fight back against this administration and their violations of the law, and to set an example for other states about what is possible,” said state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco).

This month, California became the first state in the nation to ban masks on law enforcement officers with the No Secret Police Act, which Wiener wrote. The federal government quickly tied that new rule up in court, with the first hearing scheduled Wednesday in Los Angeles.

Now, Wiener and others are pushing for more curbs. A measure by state Assemblyman Isaac G. Bryan (D-Los Angeles) would ban our state and local officers from moonlighting for the feds — something they are currently allowed to do, though it is unclear how many take advantage of that loophole.

“Their tactics have been shameful,” Bryan recently said of immigration enforcement. He pointed out that when our local cops mask up and do immigration work after hours, it leads to a serious lack of trust in their day jobs.

Wiener also introduced another measure, the No Kings Act. It would open up a new path for citizens to sue federal agents who violate their constitutional rights, because although local and state authorities can be personally sued, the ability to hold a federal officer accountable in civil court is much narrower right now.

George Retes learned that the hard way. The Iraq war vet was dragged out of his car in Ventura County by federal agents last year. Although he is a U.S. citizen, agents sprayed him with chemicals, knelt on his neck and back despite pleas that he could not breathe, detained him, took his DNA and fingerprints, strip-searched him, denied him any ability to wash off the chemicals, held him for three days without access to help, then released him with no charges and no explanation, he said.

Currently, he has few options for holding those agents accountable.

“I just got to live with the experience that they put me through with no remedy, no resolution, no answer for anything that happened to me, and I get no justice,” Retes said, speaking at a news conference. “Everyone that’s going through this currently gets no justice.”

Weiner told me that the masks and casual aggression are “designed to create an atmosphere of fear and terror, and it is and it’s having that effect,” and that without state pushback, it will only get worse.

“If California can’t stand up to Trump, then who can?” he asked Tuesday.

Good’s wife describes her as being “made of sunshine” and standing up for her immigrant neighbors when she was shot, with her dog in the back seat and her glove box full of stuffed animals for her 6-year-old son. But you wouldn’t know that from the response of federal leaders, who quickly labeled her a “domestic terrorist” and dismissed the killing as self-defense — unworthy of even a robust investigation.

The use of masks and casual aggression is “designed to create an atmosphere of fear and terror, and … it’s having that effect,” says state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), pictured in 2024.

(Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)

“Every congressional democrat and every democrat who’s running for president should be asked a simple question: Do you think this officer was wrong in defending his life against a deranged leftist who tried to run him over?” Vice President JD Vance wrote on social media one day after Good was killed.

So much for law enforcement accountability.

While Good’s death is filling headlines, there have been dozens of other instances where immigration officers’ use of force has been questionable. The Trace, an independent news source that covers gun violence, found that since the immigration crackdown began, ICE has opened fire 16 times, held people at gunpoint an additional 15 times, killed four people and injured seven.

One of those deaths was in Northridge, where Keith Porter Jr. was shot and killed by an off-duty ICE agent a few weeks ago, and his family is rightfully calling for an investigation.

That’s just the gun violence. Lots of other concerning behavior has been documented as well.

A 21-year-old protester was left with a fractured skull and blind in one eye last week in Southern California after an officer from the Department of Homeland Security fired a nonlethal round at close range toward his head. Most officers are taught, and even forbidden by policy, from firing such munitions at people’s heads for precisely this reason — they can be dangerous and even fatal if used incorrectly.

Across California, and the nation, citizens and noncitizens alike have reported being beaten and harassed, having guns pointed at them without provocation and being detained without basic rights for days.

The answer to police overreach in Floyd’s case was a reckoning in law enforcement that it needed to do better to build trust in the communities it was policing. Along with that came a nationwide push, especially in California, for reforms that would move local and state policing closer to that ideal.

The answer five years later in Good’s case — from our president, our vice president, our head of Homeland Security and others — has been to double down on impunity with the false claim that dissent is radical, and likely even a crime. And don’t fool yourself — this is exactly how President Trump sees it, as laid out in his recent executive order that labeled street-level protests as “antifa” and designated that nebulous anti-fascist movement as an organized terrorist group. He’s also set up National Guard units in every state to deal with “civil disturbances.”

So Vance is actually right — under Trump law, which is seemingly being enforced although not truly law, someone like Good could be dubbed a terrorist.

The situation has become so dire that this week six federal prosecutors resigned after the Justice Department pushed not to investigate Good’s shooting, but instead investigate Good herself — a further bid to bolster the egregious terrorist claim.

In the wake of Good’s killing, many of us feel the fear that no one is safe, an increasingly unsubtle pressure to self-censure dissent. Is it worth it to protest? Maybe for our safety and the safety of those we love, we should stay home. We just don’t know what federal authorities will do, what will happen if we speak out.

That’s the thinking that authoritarians seek to instill in the populace as they consolidate power. Just duck and cover, and maybe you won’t be the one to get hurt.

That’s why, successful or not, these new and proposed laws in California are fights the state must have for the safety of our residents, regardless of immigration status, and for the safety of democracy.

Because, truly, if California can’t stand up to Trump, who can?

Embattled Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan, who was convicted of obstruction last month for helping an immigrant evade federal officers, has sent her resignation letter to the governor.

The letter was sent Saturday. Republicans had been making plans to impeach her since her Dec. 19 conviction. A spokesperson for Gov. Tony Evers said his office received Dugan’s letter, and he would work to fill the vacancy without delay.

Dugan wrote that over the last decade she handled thousands of cases with “a commitment to treat all persons with dignity and respect, to act justly, deliberately and consistently, and to maintain a courtroom with the decorum and safety the public deserves.”

But she said the case against her is too big of a distraction.

“As you know, I am the subject of unprecedented federal legal proceedings, which are far from concluded but which present immense and complex challenges that threaten the independence of our judiciary. I am pursuing this fight for myself and for our independent judiciary,” Dugan said in her letter.

Last April, federal prosecutors accused Dugan of distracting federal officers trying to arrest a Mexican immigrant outside her courtroom and leading the man out through a private door. A federal jury convicted her of felony obstruction.

The case against Dugan was highlighted by President Trump as he pressed ahead with his sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats insisted the administration was trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the operation.

Republican Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos praised Dugan’s decision.

“I’m glad Dugan did the right thing by resigning and followed the clear direction from the Wisconsin Constitution,” Vos said.

Democrat Ann Jacobs, who is chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission board, said she agreed with Dugan that Milwaukee should have a permanent judge in place while this fight plays out.

“Despite her situation, she is ever the champion of justice, wanting to remove the judiciary from a political battle over her fate. I’m sure this is terribly hard for her but she is true to her faith and her principles,” Jacobs said in a post on X.

On April 18, immigration officers went to the Milwaukee County courthouse after learning 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan confronted agents outside her courtroom and directed them to the office of her boss, Milwaukee County Chief Judge Carl Ashley, because she told them their administrative warrant wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest Flores-Ruiz.

After the agents left, she led Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced in November he had been deported.

Funk writes for the Associated Press.

MINNEAPOLIS — A surge of federal officers in Minnesota follows new allegations of fraud by day care centers run by Somali residents.

President Trump has previously linked his administration’s immigration crackdown against Minnesota’s large Somali community to a series of fraud cases involving government programs in which most of the defendants have roots in the east African country.

Surge in federal officers

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and FBI Director Kash Patel both announced an increase in operations in Minnesota this week. The move comes after a right-wing influencer posted a video Friday claiming he had found that day care centers operated by Somali residents in Minneapolis had committed up to $100 million in fraud.

Tikki Brown, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families, said at a Monday news conference that state regulators took the influencer’s allegations seriously.

Noem posted on social media that officers were “conducting a massive investigation on childcare and other rampant fraud.” Patel said the intent was to “dismantle large-scale fraud schemes exploiting federal programs.”

Past fraud in Minnesota

Minnesota has been under the spotlight for years for Medicaid fraud, including a massive $300-million pandemic fraud case involving the nonprofit Feeding Our Future. Prosecutors said it was the country’s largest COVID-19-related fraud scam and that defendants exploited a state-run, federally funded program intended to provide food for children.
In 2022, during President Biden’s administration, 47 people were charged. The number of defendants has grown to 78 throughout the ongoing investigation.

So far, 57 people have been convicted, either because they pleaded guilty or lost at trial.

Most of the defendants are of Somali descent.

Numerous other fraud cases are being investigated, including new allegations focused on child care centers.

In news interviews and releases over the summer, prosecutor Joe Thompson estimated the loss from all fraud cases could exceed $1 billion. Earlier this month, a federal prosecutor alleged that half or more of the roughly $18 billion in federal funds that supported 14 programs in Minnesota since 2018 may have been stolen.

Crackdown targeting Somalis

Trump’s immigration enforcement in Minnesota has focused on the Somali community in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, which is the largest in the country.

Trump labeled Minnesota Somalis as “garbage” and said he didn’t want them in the United States.

About 84,000 of the 260,000 Somalis in the U.S. live in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. The overwhelming majority are U.S. citizens. Almost 58% were born in the U.S and 87% of the foreign-born are naturalized citizens.

Among those running schemes to get funds for child nutrition, housing services and autism programs, 82 of the 92 defendants are Somali Americans, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for Minnesota.

Republicans have tried to blame Walz

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee, has said fraud will not be tolerated and his administration “will continue to work with federal partners to ensure fraud is stopped and fraudsters are caught.”

The fraud could be a major issue in the 2026 gubernatorial race as Walz seeks a third term.

Walz has said an audit due by late January should give a better picture of the extent of the fraud but allowed that the $1-billion estimate could be accurate. He said his administration is taking aggressive action to prevent additional fraud. He has long defended how his administration responded.

Minnesota’s most prominent Somali American, Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, has urged people not to blame an entire community for the actions of a relative few.