Somali immigrants react to President Trump’s comments and ICE raids
An ICE operation is targeting Somali immigrants in the Twin Cities, days after President Donald Trump called Somalis “trash.”
In early November, a nanny in a major U.S. city sent a last-minute text message to the family she worked for letting them know she wouldn’t be able to come to work that day.
Her brother was being held by immigration and customs officials.
“I was with my sister-in-law and nephew,” the nanny recalls. She asked USA TODAY to withhold her name for fear of putting her family at further risk. “They were destroyed.”
The baby’s mother, for whom she is a nanny, responded by questioning her citizenship. The nanny knew about her boss’s policies even though she had never discussed them. She saw her family wearing red “Make America Great Again” hats in public and found pro-President Donald Trump flags hanging inside their home.
The nanny was born in the United States, but several family members were not. She says her brother, who has since been deported to Mexico, has lived in the United States since elementary school and has no criminal record as far as she knows. “He’s the hardest-working person I know,” she added.
The nanny told her boss that she needed a few days off to support her family while her brother was detained.
“I woke up to a very long email (from my mother), and she said, ‘What are we going to do now? … I know it’s hard, but it’s not our problem.'” Her boss said government officials had a job to do and they “just want to get rid of criminals.”
“He started crying,” the nanny says. “How can someone be so inconsiderate? Can’t she see how much I love my child, how much I care for her? And can’t she have any compassion for me?”
In 2025, ICE agents arrested more than 225,000 people, according to federal data obtained and published by the Deportation Data Project. The Trump administration has said the purpose of the arrests was to target violent criminals, but about one-third of those arrested included people with pending convictions or criminal charges. The immigration crackdown has caused widespread fear among immigrants and citizens alike, and the childcare sector is feeling the strain.
For some, school no longer feels like a safe place. The Associated Press reported that a child care worker in Chicago was detained at work in November. At least 21% of child care workers in the United States are immigrants, according to the Center for Child Care Employment Research at the University of California, Berkeley. A new report from New America, a nonpartisan think tank based in Washington, D.C., finds that the recent escalation in immigration enforcement has resulted in 39,000 fewer foreign-born child care workers and, in turn, 77,000 fewer working mothers.
Chris Herbst, a public policy professor at Arizona State University who led the New America study, said there are “many theories that have been put forward about what’s causing this decline” in women’s numbers in the workforce. “Is it the back-to-office policy? Is it the rise of tradwife culture? But no one’s really talking about the role that increased ICE activity has played.”
Immigration crackdowns have a major impact on raising children and working parents
Herbst said the child care sector is one of the labor markets most dependent on immigrants. Some of these workers have been arrested and detained this year, or have fled the country in fear, leaving some families in dire straits.
“What we’re hearing from mothers across the country is that what ICE is doing is having a truly devastating impact on the child care industry, which, honestly, was already suffering before these horrific attacks on immigrants began,” said Donna Norton, executive vice president of Moms Rising, a grassroots organization that advocates for better support for mothers and families.
And that goes without saying, Norton added, especially when ICE agents knock on the doors of schools and child care centers, which has a mental health impact on the children these agents protect.
“For mothers, it’s absolutely horrifying to see masked, armed federal agents roaming outside their children’s childcare facilities, sometimes even entering areas that are supposed to be safe for their youngest children,” Norton said. “Mothers are scared and we know their children have suffered years of deep trauma.”
Childcare providers have also lost some employees to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) “out of fear of immigration enforcement,” said Suma Sethi, a senior immigration policy analyst at the Center for Law and Social Policy, a nonprofit policy think tank in Washington, D.C. DACA is a government program that grants work permits and temporarily suspends deportation to people who entered the country illegally as children.
“It’s not just illegal immigrants” who are dropping out of the workforce, Sethi said. “It’s impacting people who actually have work permits.”
There have also been fewer U.S.-born childcare workers this year, Herbst added. Since the pandemic, progress in this area “seems to be reeling at this point due to the devastating impact ICE has had on child care.”
“And of course it affects the family’s ability to go to work,” he says.
Interestingly, Herbst’s study published by New America found that center-based facilities are seeing a decline in the number of childcare workers, but private family childcare workers, such as nannies, are on the rise. He believes center-based workers “probably feel quite exposed and quite vulnerable,” while workers working from home for individual families have more privacy.
“That doesn’t make these workers any less afraid,” Herbst added.
“I’m scared to go in there every day.”
Ever since the nanny cried after hearing her boss’ comments about ICE, she says, “I feel like I’m walking on eggshells in the house.” She is looking for a new job.
“I’m scared to go in there every day.”
She works part-time for other family members who understand her brother’s situation, the nanny said. She loves working with children and wants to be a nanny for the rest of her life. But she’s scared. She always carries her passport with her and worries every day about other family members who don’t have citizenship.
“I think it’s really unfair,” she said through tears. Her family has always paid taxes. They immigrated to the United States simply “because they wanted something better for us.” Now that he has been deported, her brother will miss the birth of their second child.
“It’s really heartbreaking because[my wife]is going to be born soon,” she said. “And it’s going to be very sad to see him not be there.”
Madeline Mitchell’s role covering women and the care economy for USA TODAY is supported by partnerships such as: extremely important and Journalism funding partners. Funders do not provide editorial input.
Contact Madeline at: memitchell@usatoday.com and @maddiemitch_ With X.
