It appears that President Donald Trump has chosen a minority to fixate on (in a racist way) this month, probably in part to keep everyone distracted from his flopping approval numbers. He’s recently closed in on Minnesota’s robust Somali community, calling them “garbage” and deploying ICE agents to Minneapolis to apprehend a handful of Somali men who he deems criminals. As a result, CNN reports, hate mail has been pouring into inboxes at mosques and other majority-Somali-American spaces.
Leaders in Minnesota’s Somali community responded swiftly; in addition to protesting and alerting each other of ICE activity, they also banded together to troll conservatives online — and they’ve been doing so in the most hilarious way possible. Pulling from MAGA’s playbook, which relies heavily on colonial imagery and reimagining history to benefit their agenda, some joked that Somalis were actually the first ever settlers of Minnesota.
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One AI video on TikTok shows a group of Somalis finding out that Minnesota was promised to them in an ancient scripture (before they get there and realize it’s a little too cold for them).
A post on X declared that one of the founding fathers was actually a Somali man, who signed the Declaration of Independence and included a clause that awarded Minnesota to Somalis.
Another shows a filtered and edited picture with the caption, “My cousin in Somalia is headed to Minnesota, his birthright trip to the promised lands.”
We’re not sure how it all started, but the trolling has gloriously snowballed to reach way, way back into history — history, this time, reimagined in favor of the Somali American community. “This was the last dinosaur that walked on the planet!” another post with an AI picture reads. “This photo was taken 3,000 years ago in what is now known as Minnesota, and they were last seen being ridden by Somalis there.”
Besides being creative and hilarious, this online movement is a juicy testament to how some marginalized communities, often robbed of their dignity and agency by bigoted law enforcement’s use of humor to cope — and, as a bonus, to piss off some conservatives along the way.
It’s becoming clear that one of the antidotes to the self-righteous rage of MAGA conservatives, who want immigrants to feel scared and hopeless, is to respond with light and humor. It’s also a pretty ingenious way of fighting their oppression with the same logic they employ. If white Americans’ European ancestors rolled up and called the United States home, why can’t Somali Americans?
Just to clarify, significant Somali immigration to Minnesota began in the 1990s, when a civil war forced many families to flee their homes. Many refugees found jobs in a meatpacking plant near Minneapolis, and brought their families through government programs to eventually create the bustling community you see today. Just as millions of European migrants did in the 20th century, Somalis came to the U.S. out of necessity and to flee war. What’s more, a vast majority of Somalis in Minnesota — about 95% — have U.S. citizenship, per PBS.
It’s curious to watch this community, during the last few weeks being “singled out by an American president who has called attention to a massive and still-unfolding case of pandemic-era fraud,” as CNN puts it, “but embraced by the state that offered them refuge from a vicious and bloody civil war decades ago.”
The attacks on Minnesota’s Somali community fueled by Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric reek of racism, xenophobia and ignorance. And this barrage of memes and parody videos are a delicious way of addressing that ignorance.
