A small Minnesota town defends Somali residents as critical to the economy

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. WILLMAR, Minn.—Nearly 30 years ago in this small agricultural town, resident Pablo Obregon did a double take at a group waiting for the bus downtown on the first day of school. They were Somali children.

“Where did they come from?" he recalls wondering. Obregon, now Willmar’s director of community growth, is no longer surprised when he sees large numbers of Somalis. So many have settled here that a lively stretch downtown is called Little Mogadishu because Somalis run more than a dozen storefront businesses.

In winter it’s not uncommon to see Somalis in traditional dress bundled up in big American-style parkas and stocking caps worn over hijabs. Somalis represent about a quarter of production workers at the Jennie-O turkey plant, the economic engine of this community of nearly 22,000 some 95 miles west of Minneapolis. But in recent days, downtown’s strip of restaurants, groceries and clothing stores has been attracting only a few customers, shopkeepers say.

ICE raids are ramping up in Minnesota, and President Trump has lashed out against immigrants from Somalia, calling them “garbage" and saying he doesn’t want them in the U.S. “They are not willing to go to work and not coming outside a lot because of fear," said Abdiweli Yusuf, a 33-year-old Somali-American, as he swept up the grocery store he owns with family members. He wore a traditional robe-like khamiis under a long wool coat and a pink stocking cap against the below-zero windchill, which he didn’t seem to mind.

“Minnesota is the most welcoming place in America," he said. “I have five kids who were born here in Willmar hospitals. This is our forever home." Many here, and across Minnesota, have been shaken by a sprawling $1