Somali leaders: Hateful rhetoric is leading to widespread harassment

Following the Friday prayer, leaders of the Somali community gathered at Karmel Mall in Minneapolis to condemn what they described as escalating anti-Somali rhetoric linked to “Operation Metro Surge” and right-wing politicians and media.  

Community and faith leaders said hateful rhetoric is fueling harassment and threats, and spreading fear among Somali Minnesotans.

Imam Yusuf Abdulle, executive director of the Islamic Association of North America, said recent “attacks did not come out of nowhere. They are fueled by years of reckless rhetoric, political scapegoating, and media narratives that repeatedly associate Somalis with crime, danger and social problems.”

Somali Minnesotans — comprising the largest group of the Somali diaspora in the United States — have often faced racism and religious bigotry over the years. 

Relentless attacks have ratcheted up in the past six months or so, however, with right-wing media and politicians castigating the entire community over state and federal investigations of fraudulent social service providers, many of them East African. Since late 2025, the Minnesota Somali community — the vast majority of whom are American citizens — have faced sweeping immigration enforcement, business break-ins, vandalism and threatening phone calls, triggering fear and unrest in the community.

The gathered advocates showed a school bus that had been set on fire by a hate group. No children were on the bus at the time of the incident, they said. 

Malika Dahir, executive director of Reviving the Islamic Sisterhood for Empowerment, played a threatening voice message left for a Somali daycare operator:  “All of you trashy Muslims, men, women, and children, will be burned to death. You will all die,” the voice said. 

The community leaders urged the wider Minnesota community, elected officials and media to actively recognize and condemn the hatred now targeting the Somali community.

Dahir said Somali children and especially little Somali girls are at particular risk because their hijabs are a symbol of Islam.

“I’m not only an advocate and community leader, but I’m also a mother; mothers are afraid, we are terrified, and we worry if our children would be targeted in school,” Dahir said.

The leaders acknowledged the widening criminal probe of social service providers and said that those accused of crimes should face legal accountability, but the rest of the community should not have to suffer the consequences of wrongdoing committed by a few, or be subject to negative media coverage fueled by political rhetoric. 

Abdulle cited the hateful words coming from the nation’s highest elective office. “Words do matter. Our president labels us as … ‘garbage,’ and ‘low IQ,’ and he does not want us in his country.”

Dahir said these words are particularly dangerous because they come from powerful figures with vast influence over their followers. She pointed to media personalities who say Somali people don’t belong here, leading their followers to think their hatred is justified.

Hodan Hassan, former legislator and current board member of Somali American Coalition Action Fund, said the Somali community should not have to live in fear because of reckless political rhetoric and media amplification.

The Somali community, Hassan said, is still reeling from the Operation Metro Surge and now waking up to another wave of targeted harassment.