Attorney General Ellison again leads court defense of Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Somalia

Leads coalition of 17 AGs in amicus brief asking federal court to hear appeal; second time this year AG Ellison and coalition have supported TPS for Somali Americans

October 27, 2026 (SAINT PAUL) — For the second time this year, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has led a coalition of 17 attorneys general in filing an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit to block Department of Homeland Security’s termination of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Somali immigrants. The TPS program is a crucial humanitarian lifeline that Congress established in the 1990 to protect immigrants from being returned to countries like Somalia that have been deemed unsafe, allowing them to work and build a life in the United States. Approximately 3,850 immigrants from Somalia have been living in the United States with TPS or have had pending applications for TPS, many of them in Minnesota.

“The Trump Administration’s insistence on terminating Temporary Protected Status for Somali nationals isn’t only cruel, it’s harmful to communities across Minnesota and in every state where Somalis live, work, grow the economy, pay taxes, and give back,” Attorney General Ellison said. “I led this coalition of attorneys general supporting the plaintiffs who want to block the revocation of TPS for Somalis because we recognize the contributions of our Somali neighbors that strengthen our states and our people and do not want our states to be harmed if the revocation is allowed to stand.”

This is the second amicus brief that Attorney General Ellison led this year of attorneys general defending Somali TPS, following the first one he led in April 2026. The brief filed yesterday in African Communities Together v. Mullin supports the plaintiffs’ request that the appeals court reverse a lower court decision not to grant emergency relief and block the Department of Homeland Security’s revocation of TPS for Somali nationals.

The coalition states are home to at least 53,000 Somali immigrants, with Minnesota alone home to at least 37,500. These numbers include TPS holders, whom the coalition states have taken public steps to support because Somali immigrants, including TPS holders, make vital contributions to the communities in which they live: they are valued neighbors, homeowners, coworkers, teachers, students, entrepreneurs, caregivers, construction workers, union members, and parents. Stripping TPS holders of legal status would harm the residents, economies, and public health and safety of Minnesota and the coalition states.

In the brief, Attorney General Ellison and the coalition highlight the harms Minnesota and the coalition states and their residents — including the U.S. citizen children of Somali nationals with TPS — will experience with the revocation of TPS for Somalis, arguing that it would harm their states’ economies, residents, and public health and safety.

Somali immigrants make a significant, positive impact on Minnesota’s economy: their annual economic impact is roughly $8.6 billion and they pay an estimated $228 million annually in state and local taxes. They also contribute to critical industries: as of 2019, over 15 percent of all Somali immigrants in Minnesota worked in home health care, and Somali workers made up 11 percent of the state’s workers in animal food processing. Somali immigrants are also known for their entrepreneurship, starting businesses that create jobs, circulate dollars locally, and revitalize communities. The Minnesota Department of Economic Development has recognized that “[w]ithout foreign-born workers,” of which Somalis are the second-largest group in Minnesota, “many businesses in Minnesota would not have the workers they need to operate, let alone grow and thrive.” Allowing the revocation of Somalia’s TPS designation to stand endangers these economic contributions to communities in every corner of Minnesota.

Creating new undocumented citizens by revoking TPS for Somali nationals would have ripple effects throughout educational and public-health systems. Operation Metro Surge, the purpose of which President Trump claimed was to root out fraud in Somali communities in Minnesota, led to high rates of absenteeism throughout public schools in Minneapolis, including of U.S. citizen children of Somali immigrants — many of whom themselves are U.S. citizens.

Stripping legal status from Somali immigrants also risks serious negative consequences for public health. Everyone benefits when residents are vaccinated or seek testing and treatment for infectious diseases. But undocumented immigrants are often reluctant to seek medical treatment due to fear of detention and deportation. Newly undocumented former TPS holders may also not seek treatment for their U.S. citizen children. Children of undocumented immigrants frequently miss preventive annual exams and are often sicker when seeking emergency room care. In Minneapolis, 40 percent of respondents to a recent survey who needed to go to urgent care or the hospital during Operation Metro Surge reported they stayed home because of fears about ICE agents, and 30 percent of respondents who had a regularly scheduled vaccine during the operation missed the vaccine out of the same fears.

The impacts on the mental health and well-being of revoking TPS for Somali nationals on their U.S. citizen children would also be severe. Children of undocumented parents in the United States frequently experience persistent anxiety from fear that a family member may be deported. During Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota, immigration officers targeted individuals they believed appeared to be Somali regardless of citizenship or immigration status, demonstrating that these fears were unfortunately well founded.

Mental health consequences are even more severe when these fears are realized and families are forcibly separated. Parental deportation is deeply traumatic for children and is linked to extreme psychological distress, anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, externalizing behaviors such as aggression, and difficulties sleeping.

In the brief, Attorney General Ellison and the coalition note that revoking Somalia’s TPS designation would present current TPS holders, particularly those with U.S. citizen children, with an agonizing choice: 

History of TPS for Somali nationals

Somalia was first designated for TPS in 1991 by Acting Attorney General William Barr due to “extraordinary and temporary conditions.” Civil war has raged in Somalia for the ensuing 35 years, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths, children being forced into combat, extrajudicial killings, sexual and gender-based violence, and other human-rights abuses. Given the ongoing violence and suffering, Somalia’s TPS designation had been continually in place until now.

In November 2025, President Trump posted on social media that he was “hereby terminating, effective immediately, the Temporary Protected Status (TPS Program) for Somalis in Minnesota...” Since then, President Trump has repeatedly launched racist attacks against Somali immigrants, calling them “garbage” and “stupid people” with “low IQs” “from a crooked country, disgusting country, one of the worst countries in the world.” In January 2026, Kristi then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem announced she was terminating Somalia’s TPS designation in part even though she did not claim that Somalia as a whole is safe and despite the fact that the U.S. State Department has issued its highest travel advisory for Somalia, warning travelers, “Do not travel to Somalia for any reason,” because of “unrest, crime, kidnapping, terrorism,” and more.

Following a June 2026 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, DHS revoked TPS for immigrants from Somalia on August 14, 2026.

Attorney General Ellison led the coalition that filed the amicus brief. Joining Attorney General Ellison in the coalition are the attorneys general of California, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington.