Jonathan P. Baird

Among the most repellent things Donald Trump has said were his comments on December 2 that Somali immigrants were “garbage”. He said, “They contribute nothing. I don’t want them in my country. Their country is no good for a reason. Their country stinks”. He went on to say Somali immigrants “have destroyed our country”. He singled out Congresswoman Ilhan Omar who is Somali saying she “shouldn’t be allowed to serve in Congress” and she “should be thrown out of our country”.

Minnesota has the largest concentration of Somalis in the country. About 84,000 people of Somali descent live in Minnesota. They have settled in Minnesota over the last three decades. The great majority are U.S. citizens or legal residents. There are very few undocumented Somalis.

Trump’s comments followed his first term remarks where he referred to African nations and Haiti as “shithole” countries.

Intentional dehumanization such as Trump’s racist rant creates a permission structure for violently-inclined MAGA followers to act out against people of color. Some portion of white supremacists in the MAGA base get their switch flipped by the venom. Acts of violence or shootings against those perceived as Somali are predictable along with accompanying manifestos justifying the acts based on great replacement theory.

Congresswoman Omar has received many death threats. In February 2019, the FBI arrested a Coast Guard Lieutenant for plotting to assassinate Omar. Later in April 2019, a man threatened to assault and murder Omar in a phone call to her office and he ended up pleading guilty. Trump re-tweeted a tweet that falsely said Omar partied on the anniversary of 9/11. Omar has been a prime target of online hate. The newest Trump comments further endanger her life.

It is notable that none of the cabinet members or people around Trump publicly reacted to the racist offensiveness of his comments about Somalis. Profiles in courage – not. It is more like profiles in moral debasement. Nothing that comes out of Trump’s mouth would propel his circle of sycophants to say a peep. Silence is golden like everything around Trump.

Trump’s language is reminiscent of the German Nazi terminology directed against Jews. The Nazis saw Jews as racially inferior sub-humans. Negatively categorizing entire groups as garbage is unacceptable and below any standard of civilized public discourse.

In justification of his remarks, Trump cited alleged fraud committed by Somali immigrants. Dozens of Somali immigrants have been charged with fraud for allegedly stealing $1 billion from Minnesota’s COVID-19 pandemic relief.

Even if Somalis were engaged in fraud, they are still entitled to the presumption of innocence like all criminal defendants. In the United States, estimates for the total amount of COVID-19 relief fraud range from hundreds of billions to over $1 trillion. The Paycheck Protection Program, Economic Injury Disaster Loans and unemployment insurance all experienced widespread fraud because prevention controls were relaxed.

There is no reason to single out Somalis considering the national scope of the fraud. They were hardly alone. Also, it prejudices the fraud cases of the Somali defendants when a President weighs in. Because of the President’s influence, a fair trial becomes much harder to accomplish.

What Trump does not mention is the unprecedented corruption of his own regime. Being a convicted felon himself, you might think that someone with his track record for self-dealing and for pardoning white collar fraudsters would tread lightly. He just pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former President of Honduras, who was convicted in federal court for drug trafficking 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S. Trump has used the pardon power to normalize corruption. His hands could not be dirtier. He makes the 19th century robber barons look like choir boys.

As bad as the overt racism, Trump’s comments about Somalis also reflect total ignorance of Africa and its history. I was reminded of a book I read a long time ago, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, by Walter Rodney, a historian from Guyana. Trump evinces no awareness of the history of slavery and European colonialism in Africa. Africa was robbed by the Europeans and later by the Americans. It was made poor because of the slave trade and economic exploitation. Rodney writes:

“The question as to who and what, is responsible for African underdevelopment can be answered at two levels. Firstly, the answer is that the operation of the imperialist system bears major responsibility for African economic retardation by draining African wealth and by making it impossible to develop more rapidly the resources of the continent. Secondly, one has to deal who those who manipulated the system and those who are either agents or unwitting accomplices of the said system. The capitalists of Western Europe were the ones who actively extended their exploitation from inside Europe to cover the whole of Africa.”

American slave traders and capitalists followed up on the exploitation and to some extent replaced the Europeans. Rodney doesn’t remove the ultimate responsibility for development from the shoulders of Africans but he recognizes that African poverty must be seen inside the context of colonialism and imperialism.

Like the rest of Africa, Somalia was victimized by European colonialists, primarily Italians. European powers colonized Somalia in the late 19th century as part of the scramble for Africa. Both the British and the Italians had colonies there and Somalia did not gain independence until 1960. It has become the model for a failed state considering the constant warring but the historical background is not appreciated as evidenced by Trump’s scapegoating. He quite obviously knows nothing about Somalia.

It is like the news cycle has already moved on from the Somalis as garbage comments. The public is anesthetized to the racism. America’s collective response to the comments has been pitifully weak. Voltaire once said, “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities”. Those words still ring true. We must never forget that all human beings have inalienable rights by virtue of being human.