President Trump has halted Somali immigration through executive orders suspending the refugee program, imposing travel bans, and ordering comprehensive reviews of refugees admitted under the Biden administration, reviews that could result in deportations.
These actions follow documented patterns of widespread immigration fraud, welfare fraud exceeding $1 billion, and persistently high dependency rates, with 81 percent of Somali households receiving public assistance despite many having lived in the United States for two to three decades.
Despite this long-term presence, welfare dependence remains exceptionally high. Minnesota data from 2014 to 2023, analyzed by the Center for Immigration Studies using Census Bureau American Community Survey data, show an overall welfare-use rate of 81 percent among Somalis.
This includes 27 percent receiving cash assistance through TANF, SSI, or General Assistance, 54 percent receiving SNAP benefits, and 73 percent enrolled in Medicaid. Among Somali households with children, 89 percent receive some form of welfare. Even among working-age adults who have lived in the United States for more than 10 years, roughly half report that they cannot speak English “very well.”
Investigations have shown that Somali immigration has been rife with fraud, particularly under the Priority 3 (P-3) Family Reunification Program between 2003 and 2008. The P-3 program, created under the Refugee Act of 1980, allowed refugees to sponsor spouses, unmarried children, and parents for refugee status. During this period, Africans accounted for more than 95 percent of arrivals through the program, with Somalis comprising a large share.
In 2008, DNA testing exposed widespread abuse. A pilot program in Nairobi involving 476 applicants found that only 16 percent were genetically related to every person they claimed as family. Expanded testing of approximately 3,000 applicants, primarily Somalis, Ethiopians, and Liberians, revealed that more than 80 percent of cases included at least one person falsely claimed as a biological relative. Some reports placed fraud rates among Somali applicants as high as 87 to 90 percent. These findings were documented in a U.S. State Department report released in November 2008.
In response, President George W. Bush suspended the P-3 program in March 2008. By that point, roughly 36,000 people, mostly Africans and largely Somalis, had already entered the United States through the program, with the majority resettling in Minnesota.
The program remained suspended until 2012. Documented fraud methods included inventing “ghost children,” selling slots in family applications, fabricating family structures, and presenting clan-based or informal adoptions as biological relationships. While such practices may be culturally accepted in Somalia, they are not recognized under U.S. immigration law.
Retired ICE official Charles Thaddeus Fillinger described the P-3 abuse in a 2018 report as “the greatest refugee fraud crisis in modern times” and “possibly the biggest blunder in immigration history,” stating that thousands of fraudulent refugees using false identities entered the United States before the suspension.
When the program was reinstated in 2012, DNA testing became mandatory for all claimed parent-child relationships, eligibility was narrowed to spouses, unmarried children under 21, or parents, and fraud controls were tightened. As a result, P-3 arrivals dropped from 15 to 20 percent of all refugee admissions to less than 1 percent.
Upon assuming office in January 2025, President Trump moved quickly to halt Somali refugee inflows and reassess prior admissions by signing an executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program. This was followed on June 5, 2025, by a travel ban fully suspending immigrant and nonimmigrant entry from 12 countries, including Somalia.
On October 31, 2025, Trump set the fiscal year 2026 refugee cap at 7,500, the lowest in U.S. history, with most slots reserved for Afrikaners from South Africa. As a result, new refugee admissions from Somalia have effectively stopped. While 38,000 refugees were admitted during the final four months of the Biden administration, only 506 were admitted through November 2025 under Trump.
The administration also ordered a sweeping review of refugees admitted under Biden. On November 21, 2025, USCIS Director Joseph Edlow directed the re-examination of all refugees admitted between January 20, 2021, and February 20, 2025, an estimated 200,000 to 235,000 people across all nationalities, including Somalis. USCIS will re-interview refugees to determine whether they met the legal definition of a refugee at entry and whether legal barriers exist to permanent residency.
The review includes individuals who already received green cards, and all pending green card applications from this period have been placed on indefinite hold. Refugees found ineligible will have their status terminated without the right to appeal, and denials will extend to family members, potentially resulting in deportation proceedings.
Additional restrictions were imposed in December 2025 after a shooting involving an Afghan national. The administration paused all immigration-related applications, including asylum, green cards, citizenship, and work authorization, for nationals of 19 banned countries, including Somalia. The pause applies to both new applications and retroactive reviews of approved cases. These measures primarily affect refugees admitted between 2021 and 2025, though USCIS has stated that earlier cases may also be reviewed when deemed appropriate.
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