A look inside the Somali mall where Omar reappeared after DC raid raises more failed assimilation concerns
MINNEAPOLIS — The day after Rep. Ilhan Omar's first public appearance since the raid on her home, Fox News Digital was given a tour of the mall where she reemerged in her home state.
The footage provides a glimpse inside an enclave within America that is dominated by Somalis and Somali culture, and a gives a peak into the community that Omar represents in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The mall isn't just a place for people to buy clothing, food and receive services, but is a "community hub" of mostly women entrepreneurs, as described by a female shop owner.
"We're here today are Karmel Mall with brother Basim, to kind of browse through this amazing community, corridor that is full of amazing women," she told Fox News Digital, referring the Karmel Mall of Somalia's owner, Basim Sabri, who provided the tour.
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Sabri, a Gaza-born immigrant, came to the United States to study in Minneapolis. During that time, he became a real-estate investor and steadily grew his business in the years to come. Now, he's a local titan of industry and owns a vast real estate empire, which includes the mall and several apartment complexes in the area that house Somalis. He has political ties at all levels of local and state politics, and is friends with Omar. He also knew the Somali-born congresswoman's father.
Fox News Digital interviewed him separately, days before the official tour of the mall.
For most inside, English is the mall's second language. It's packed with stores offering electronic SIM cards to call overseas, foreign money exchanges and travel agencies arranging trips to the Middle East and East Africa. Vendors also sell gold, fragrances and traditional Somali fashion items, mostly for women.
There are Somali barber shops, cafes, traditional Somali food vendors and henna tattoo shops. Sabri gave conflicting figures on the exact number of stores, once saying 900, and later 750.
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It sports a food court with a giant Somali flag painted on the ceiling, as well as Somali, Palestinian and American flags hanging from the walls. Many politicians use that space for press conferences, Sabri explained.
It's also where Omar ate lunch with friends, supporters and state Attorney General Keith Ellison during Fox News Digital's foray into the mall when the lawmaker reemerged after casting an early ballot in her own reelection.
Karmel Mall also has an Islamic weekend school for children, where they're taught the Quran and engage in recreational activities.
While the mall isn't strictly for Somalis, few outside the Somali community were present when Fox News Digital toured. Fox News Digital was initially bucked by security upon attempting to enter and film inside the mall without Sabri's permission.
The owner once banned Democratic Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey from the premises in February 2024 after he vetoed an Israel-Gaza ceasefire resolution passed by the City Council.
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"It is kind of an incubator setting where many businesses start in here, and then many succeed and grow and move somewhere else, to a bigger space," Sabri explained to Fox News Digital.
He claims that the mall is a space where Somalis learn to integrate into the community.
"You can see [the] Somalis not only integrating in the community, but also prospering," he said. "Somalis are very smart business individuals."
But the mall's very name — the Karmel Mall of Somalia — along with the overwhelmingly Somali culture inside, raise questions about whether the group is actually assimilating into American society.
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Steven Camerota is the director for research at the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS). He pointed Fox News Digital to a CIS report published in December of last year that describes Somalis as a "struggling group."
The report shows that more than half of children who live in the homes of Somali-born immigrants in Minnesota live in poverty, compared to only 8% of children living in homes of native-born Minnesotans. Among Somali-born immigrants who have lived in the United States for more than a decade, half cannot speak English "very well." The report says that 89% of Somali households receive some form of welfare, and 39% don't have high school diplomas, compared to only 8% of the native population.
Camerota argued that across America, assimilation among various foreign-born groups, including Somalis, has dropped, though today's immigration numbers are about the same they were during America's first great wave of immigration.
In the late 19th- and early 20th-centuries, immigrations from across the world flooded the United States. During that time, immigrants comprised about 15% of America's population, on par with todays numbers. After World War I, restrictive immigration policies that lasted until the 1960s took effect. In more recent history, immigration has ramped up to the tune of one million legal immigrants per year entering the United States, Camerota said.
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"So, there are three big things about modern immigration that you can argue greatly hinder assimilation, and it has much less to do with the immigrants, and a lot more to do with just modern conditions," he told Fox News Digital. "The first is technology. You can fly home and visit home for the holidays if you want. In a way that just wouldn't have been possible in 1900, and in terms of costs."
Camerota noted that the internet allows people access to constant news from home, and the constant ability to stay connected with family and friends via phone and video calls.
"So this technology, travel and communications is fundamentally different today than in the past. And that likely means that the connection with the home country doesn't become as attenuated as quickly as it would have," he said.
The attitudes of those who Camerota characterizes as "elites," in academia, government, media and other institutions has also changed. He said there are now dueling theories about the what exactly America is that could be contributing to a lack of assimilation.
"So is America essentially a magnificent historical project of democracy and equality and republican government, or is it essentially — most of that's a sham and it's really a racist, sexist, homophobic [and] classist society?" he said. "The immigrants are arriving in a country in many ways that received both those messages, and so this elite attitude which permeates down is just so different than the world of the last great wave of immigration and almost certainly matters a great deal."
Essentially, Camerota argued, if immigrants adopt the narrative that America is a fundamentally flawed nation, there is little reason for them to assimilate.
"The word assimilation itself is seen as a bad word in many circles. The idea that immigrants are supposed to shed their their old culture and become American is now seen as a kind of for some — I don't want to say universally for all — but some fraction of it at least, as an undesirable Anglo conformity," he continued.
"We are living in a country that can't really agree itself about its own history, let alone agree on what it wants from the immigrants."
The third important fact to assimilation in Camerota's mind is the sheer number of immigrants coming to the United States.
"The last point is numbers," he said. "So, we're at a record high now, right? 15% of the population is foreign born. It's matched the levels of between 1890 and 1910 ... during the last peak of the last great wave. But the one question then has to be asked, what happened then?"
He said the immigration restriction of the mid 20th-century necessarily resulted in assimilation, as immigrants could not endlessly build enclaves for more and more foreign-born residents, as is happening today.
"I think it's pretty clear it likely played a very big role in facilitating the assimilation of the immigrants," he said, suggesting that a similar immigration restriction could have the same effect if implemented now.
Sabri has faced troubles of his own.
In 2005, he was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison for bribing a local Minneapolis public official. He told Fox News Digital in the first interview about his time in prison, which included a brief stay at the infamous Federal Correctional Institution, Leavenworth in Kansas, in colorful detail.
In that interview, he also insisted that the mall is for everyone.
"But my experience is that Somalis are very, very intelligent and extremely hard-working people," he said.
"So, I would invite anybody to come into the mall, and know that there are many people doing a great job and making a good living, and learning the American dream, and doing business, and opening businesses that eventually tend to be very successful for them."