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The refugees, many of them from Somalia, had passed security screenings before coming to the United States. The Trump administration has vowed to “re-examine thousands of refugee cases.”
Jan. 13, 2026, 7:35 p.m. ET
Federal immigration agents in recent days have arrested dozens of refugees in Minnesota who had passed security screenings before being admitted to the United States, according to their lawyers and immigrant rights advocates.
The arrests of the refugees, who are mainly from Somalia and include children, come after an announcement last Friday that the Trump administration would “re-examine thousands of refugee cases through new background checks,” focusing on people who have yet to obtain green cards after arriving in the United States in the last year or so. But that announcement, by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, did not say that the refugees would be subject to arrest and transfer to immigrant detention facilities.
Citizenship and Immigration Services did not respond to emailed questions on Tuesday. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency that detained the refugees, according to the lawyers, also did not respond.
Michele Garnett McKenzie, executive director at the Advocates for Human Rights in Minneapolis, said most of the detainees were being transferred to facilities in Texas. She estimated that at least 100 people had been detained.
“It’s happening very fast,” she said, adding, “It’s devastating the community.”
Among the cases she cited was one of a Somali mother who was detained, leaving behind a toddler, and another family in which a mother and two adult children were detained.
President Trump closed the United States to refugees from around the world on his first day in office. In November, he began targeting refugees in Minnesota, a blue state with the country’s largest Somali population, amid reports that some Somalis there had defrauded the state, collecting millions of dollars in social services that were never provided.
