How many Somali refugees did Obama settle in Minnesota?
Executive summary
The most reliable public data show that 6,320 refugees from Somalia were resettled in Minnesota during Barack Obama’s two presidential terms (Jan. 2009–Jan. 2017), while roughly 54,000 Somali refugees arrived in the United States overall during that period [1] [2]. Claims that Obama “settled 70,000” Somalis in Minnesota are demonstrably false and have circulated as part of politically charged social-media memes [2] [3].
1. The official numbers: what federal and state records say
Data compiled by the U.S. State Department’s Refugee Processing Center and reported in multiple fact-checks put the nationwide total of Somali refugees admitted under the Obama administration at about 54,000, and specify that 6,320 of those were resettled in Minnesota between 2009 and 2017 [2] [1] [4] [3].
2. The false headline and how it spread
A viral claim — that Obama resettled 70,000 Somalis in Minnesota to influence elections — far exceeds both the national and state figures and was repeatedly debunked by Reuters, AP, USA Today, FactCheck.org and others; the meme’s number is larger than the total Somali admissions to the entire United States under Obama [2] [3] [4].
3. Historical context: Minnesota’s long-standing Somali community
Minnesota’s Somali population did not originate with the Obama years; state records and reporting note thousands of Somali refugees arrived in earlier decades, with Minnesota reporting roughly 23,915 arrivals from Somalia between 1979 and 2017 and other state tallies showing continued migration and secondary moves into the state [3] [5]. That broader history helps explain why Minnesota consistently receives more Somali arrivals than most other states [3].
4. Why the discrepancy matters: secondary migration and counting challenges
Fact-checkers caution that counts of “resettled” refugees track initial federal placements and do not fully capture later secondary migration — refugees who move from one U.S. state to another after initial placement — so Minnesota’s Somali population can be larger than the initial resettlement figure; the Minnesota Department of Health and other state sources note documented secondary arrivals and that there’s no systematic way to capture all such movements [3] [5].
5. Political uses of the numbers and implicit agendas
The 70,000 figure has been deployed in online and political messaging to imply deliberate partisan engineering of electoral outcomes and to delegitimize Somali-American politicians; media fact-checkers explicitly link the viral claim to efforts to portray refugee resettlement as a partisan tool, and they trace the claim to social-media memes rather than to any government report [2] [6]. Those pushing the exaggerated figure have an incentive to inflame voter anxiety about immigration and demographic change.
6. What the numbers do — and do not — prove about political influence
Even accepting the official 6,320 figure for Minnesota under Obama, experts and fact-checkers note many of those arrivals would not immediately have been eligible voters, and the long-term political impact of refugee resettlement is shaped by births, naturalization, secondary migration and civic integration over decades rather than a single administration’s admissions totals [7] [4]. Assertions that a specific admissions cohort “rigged” any individual election oversimplify complex demographic and electoral dynamics.
7. Remaining reporting limits and open questions
Public sources clearly establish the 6,320 Minnesota placements during Obama’s presidency and the roughly 54,000 nationwide total, but available federal datasets and state reports have recognized that tracking secondary moves and community growth over time is imperfect; further research into naturalization timing, voter-registration patterns, and secondary migration would be needed to quantify longer-term civic impacts [3] [5].