A Somali Man With No Serious Criminal Record Is Spending 9/11 in Detention at Guantanamo Bay

Adam Abdullah came to the United States as an asylum seeker and was legally working in the country when he was arrested by federal immigration agents in December.

Abdullah is now being held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba—in the military prison that was originally set up to detain suspected terrorists in the wake of the September 11, 2001, attacks. He’s been sent there despite having a criminal record that consists of nothing more serious than a pair of parking tickets.

“Obviously, there is a political rationale for sending immigrants to Guantanamo that has nothing to do with national security or immigration enforcement,” Marc Prokosch, a Minnesota-based immigration attorney who is representing Abdullah, tells Reason. There is no reason why Abdullah couldn’t be detained at a county jail or other immigration facility in the United States, says Prokosch.

Abdullah told Minnesota Public Radio that he came to the U.S. in 2023 seeking asylum, and that he had a work permit and was employed as an auto mechanic. That did not stop immigration officials from arresting him during the Trump administration’s “Operation Metro Surge” in the Twin Cities. After being detained in December, Abdullah was told he would be deported back to Somalia.

Instead, he’s been held at Guantanamo Bay for the past two weeks.

Prokosch told Reason that detaining immigrants at the notorious Cuban prison creates logistical hurdles for providing legal aid.

“If I have a client detained at a facility in the US, I can go physically visit them and ask for a secure, private room,” he says. “Obviously, I can’t go to Guantanamo as a private attorney. I can speak with him by phone, but I have no assurances that attorney-client confidentiality is being maintained.”

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has sued the Trump administration over its decision to detain immigrants at Guantanamo. The next hearing in that lawsuit is scheduled for October 14 before a district court in Washington, D.C.

“Detaining immigrants at the notorious Guantanamo military base is illegal and illogical,” Lee Gelernt, the lead attorney on that lawsuit for the ACLU, told Reason via email. “It’s far more costly and logistically difficult and was always just about political theatre.”

In a statement to The Washington Sun, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the immigrants being detained at Guantanamo are “some of the worst of the worst” who have been detained during the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. The Sun noted that DHS did not respond to questions about Abdullah’s seemingly innocuous criminal record. The department also did not respond to questions from Reason about Abdullah’s detention.

As the country reflects on the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and the sprawling “war on terror” that unfolded in their aftermath, the use of Guantanamo to detain someone like Abdullah offers a stark lesson in how far the government has stretched the notion of “national security.” Abdullah has not been accused of plotting terrorism or mass murder. He was in the country legally until the Trump administration revoked that legal status. Now, he’s being used as a political prop by an administration that prioritizes performative and senseless cruelty.

“Guantanamo has been a stain on the United States’ commitment to the rule of law,” wrote Gelernt. “It was after 9-11 and certainly is now.”