He is an Uber driver in the United States. Now he fears Somalia’s jihadists

Mahad Mohamed, who was deported from the U.S. city of Minneapolis last month as winter approached, is slowly adjusting to the heat, chaos and tension in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu.

Somalis call the 36-year-old Garyaqaan, a word that translates to “judge.”

This is the name he uses on TikTok, where he has attracted nearly 500,000 followers while abroad. Fans praise Mahad for defending interests of his tribe – part of Somalia Lucrative TikTok Hype Subculture.

But for those responsible for the White House-related Rapid Response 47 X account, Mahad is a “criminal and illegal scumbag”. In an October post, it accused him of “being involved in the kidnapping of French officials” from a hotel in the Somali capital.

Mahad denied the accusation, saying he was not in Mogadishu at the time. He was never convicted and the case was dropped.

He said he was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) because rival TikToker leaked his address.

“ICE told me they had two cases against me, one for illegal entry and one for kidnapping a French official.”

Mahad said the kidnapping was handled by the FBI, who cleared him after questioning.

But that didn’t save him from deportation.

His journey from Somalia to the United States began more than a decade ago, first to South Africa, where he lived until 2021. But he said he was attacked by armed men in a xenophobic attack.

He then traveled to Brazil and traveled north, eventually entering the United States through the Mexican border without documentation.

“When I crossed the fence from Mexico, I was arrested and detained for a month,” Mahad said.

“I later obtained a work permit as my asylum application was in progress.”

Then he headed to Minneapolis. “I used to be an Uber driver. I’m happy to finally be in the land of my dreams. I hope they accept me.”

His TikTok career also took off, giving him a steady income and fans sending him gifts while watching his live streams. His defense of the government also resulted in threats to his life from the Somali Islamist militant group al-Shabab.

That threat was part of the reason he applied for asylum in the United States.

Mahad described in vivid detail how immigration officials arrested him in early May.

Shortly after finishing breakfast, he walked to his car, figuring he was about to start another day of driving for Uber.

“Bang, they’re coming for me,” he said.

According to Mahad, he was taken a 30-minute drive to ICE headquarters serving Minneapolis and its sister city St. Paul, and then transferred over a six-hour drive to the Kandiyohi County Jail in Willmar, Minn., where he said he was detained for six months.

He told the BBC that three months of that period were spent waiting for a decision on his asylum case and the remaining three months were spent waiting for deportation. Authorities rejected his asylum application because they did not believe he would be in danger in Somalia.

Mahad said he was briefly transferred to Arizona, where the deportation fight began, but each time he was told the logistics weren’t ready yet.

During one of the trips, he was held in a holding area for people waiting to board deportation flights along with 39 detainees, including nationals of Kenya, Ethiopia and Eritrea.

Finally, speaking of his own departure, Mahad said he was put into a tight restraint jacket and flown on a small plane with seven other deportees and some guards.

They first traveled to Costa Rica in Central America, then to Senegal in West Africa, and finally to Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. There, the restraint jacket was removed and he was handcuffed before being taken to another plane bound for Mogadishu, Mahad said.

After three months of waiting to be deported, Mahad has resigned himself to his fate and has no particular emotions about returning.

After ten years of absence, he was finally reunited with his three children. “I wouldn’t trade this moment for anything now…I haven’t seen them in ten years,” Mahad said.

But he still preferred to stay in the United States because he feared for his life after receiving text messages from Al-Shabaab containing death threats.

He takes extra security precautions when he’s out and about in a well-protected home, but for security reasons he didn’t want to reveal more details or share the content of the threats.

After Mahad returned home, he was welcomed by many family members, including local politicians, due to his TikTok profile. He understands that because of his social media presence, he may have access to opportunities not available to other Somalis deported or threatened with deportation from the United States.

Last month, President Donald Trump said he would end Temporary Protected Status, which is designed to prevent people from being deported when their home countries are unsafe.

Earlier this month, he upped the ante, saying he didn’t want Somali immigrants entering the United States, telling reporters they should “go back to where they came from” and that “their country is bad for a reason.”

Somalia has not had a central government that controls the entire country since President Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991. People have had to endure years of near-anarchy and insecurity – and even now, despite the establishment of a government in Mogadishu, Islamist militants still control much of the country and occasionally launch attacks in the capital.

Trump’s comments came after he was asked about massive fraud in Minnesota’s social assistance program.

Dozens of people have been charged in a scheme that federal prosecutors say involved a charity fraudulently billing the state for children’s meals during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Some Somali immigrants were involved in the alleged scheme.

After the president’s comments about Somalis, videos circulated on social media showing immigration officers knocking on doors across Minneapolis, including in the area known as Little Mogadishu and St. Paul.

For many in the city’s Somali community, the posts were a cause for alarm. The Somali community is the largest in the United States, with approximately 80,000 people.

The BBC also spoke to five young Somali men who are now confined to a friend’s small house every day, tiptoeing through rooms that are not their own. Last week, they abruptly left their rented apartment, not because they wanted to but because the lease was in their names.

As people granted Temporary Protected Status, they worry it’s only a matter of time before ICE tracks their address and catches them. They grabbed what they could carry and slipped away during the night, hoping that a change of location would provide some protection.

Now, their lives are on hold. Missed a shift. Skipping meals or extending meal times. One of the men described how quickly everything fell apart: “We were running out of food. We didn’t go to work for the past five days because we were afraid ICE might be waiting for us. I didn’t know what was going to happen to us.”

Although there are no official figures, Mahad is not the only person deported to Somalia in recent months.

The BBC also spoke to another young Somali man who asked to remain anonymous. He said he was trying to rebuild his life back in Mogadishu.

He comes from rural Somalia and desperately needs to leave as a long drought destroys his livelihood. He illegally entered the United States through the Mexican border after traveling north from Brazil, but was detained shortly after. He was imprisoned for 18 months before being returned to Somalia.

He said by phone that he felt uncertain about his future.

“They asked me to start from scratch,” he said. “Everything I worked for was gone.”

He said he spent around $20,000 (£15,000) to get to the United States, including money borrowed from friends and family.

He returned home penniless and said he had no chance in Somalia.

“I don’t see a future here,” he said. “Nothing happened…no work.”

He is now considering emigrating again.

“I don’t want to start my life over again. I just want to immigrate to any country now.”