A handful of immigrants and advocacy organizations are asking the Trump Administration to extend its March 17 deadline to end the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) afforded to Somalis in the U.S., arguing that the Administration is changing the immigration designation purely along lines motivated by race.
The change in designation would force roughly 1,080 Somali TPS recipients to self-deport or turn themselves in to immigration enforcement, according to a Tuesday filing before a Massachusetts district court.
“President Trump has smeared the Somali community publicly, categorically, and repeatedly. He has called Somali people garbage and low IQ people. And he has said point blank: I dont want [Somali people] in our country,” the challenge states, referring to remarks President Donald Trump made at a cabinet meeting last year.
“They reflect a desire to target and punish Somali nationals based on their race and national origin in violation of the U.S. Constitution,” the lawsuit continued.
The suit is brought by African Communities Together and the Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans and lists the Department of Homeland Security as a defendant.
Their challenge comes amid President Donald Trumps crackdown on illegal immigration and his administrations continued focus on Somali populations in states like Minnesota, where national attention.
Trump has had an eye towards Somalia since his first term, when, in 2017, he included the country in a travel ban. That focus resurfaced in November 2025 amid news that a number of predominantly had allegedly siphoned as much as $9 billion from Minnesota government assistance programs.
The news prompted Trumps first move against Somali TPS.
“Minnesota is a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity. I am, as president of the United States, hereby terminating, effective immediately, the Temporary Protected Status for Somalis in Minnesota,” Trump wrote in a November post on Truth Social.
Outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem made the designation switch official in January.
Asked about the TPS designation in the wake of Noems recent ouster from the agency earlier this month, a DHS spokesperson confirmed the plans remained unchanged.
“Temporary means temporary. Country conditions in Somalia have improved to the point that it no longer meets the laws requirement for Temporary Protected Status. Allowing Somali nationals to remain temporarily in the United States is contrary to our national interests. The Trump administration is putting Americans first,” an agency spokesperson told Fox News Digital.
Under the Immigration Law of 1990, Aliens protected by TPS are allowed to work in the United States and are shielded from removal â as long as their country of origin is experiencing “temporary conditions” like war or natural disaster that would prevent their safe return. The attorney general may extend a countrys TPS status for 18 months at a time.
Somalia, having received TPS in 1991, has held a TPS designation for 35 years.
Tuesdays filing argues dangerous conditions remain in place, citing terrorist activity
