A surge in federal officers in Minnesota is focusing on alleged fraud at day care centers

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — An increase in the number of federal officers in Minnesota follows new allegations of fraud at day care centers run by Somali residents.

President Donald Trump has previously linked the immigration campaign launched by his administration against the large Somali community in Minnesota to a series of fraud cases involving government programs in which most of the defendants have their roots in the East African country.
Increase in federal officers

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and FBI Director Kash Patel announced increased operations in Minnesota this week. The move comes after a right-wing influencer posted a video on Friday claiming he discovered daycare centers run by Somali residents in Minneapolis had committed fraud amounting to $100 million.

Tiki Brown, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families, said in a press conference on Monday that state regulators took the influencer’s allegations seriously.

Noem posted on social media that officers were “conducting a wide-ranging investigation into child welfare and other rampant fraud.” The goal was “to dismantle large-scale fraud schemes that exploit federal programs,” Patel said.

Previous fraud in Minnesota

Minnesota has been in the spotlight for years for Medicaid fraud, including a massive $300 million pandemic fraud case involving the nonprofit Feeding Our Future. Prosecutors said it was the largest COVID-19 scam in the country, and that the defendants took advantage of a state-run and federally funded program aimed at providing food to children.

In 2022, under President Joe Biden’s administration, 47 people were charged. The number of defendants increased to 78 during the ongoing investigations.

So far, 57 people have been convicted, either because they pleaded guilty or because they lost at trial.
Most of the accused are of Somali origin.

Several other cases of fraud are being investigated, including new allegations focusing on child care centers.

In news interviews and press releases over the summer, Attorney General Joe Thompson estimated that the total loss from all the fraud cases could exceed $1 billion. Earlier this month, a federal prosecutor alleged that half or more of the roughly $18 billion in federal funds that have supported 14 programs in Minnesota since 2018 may have been stolen.

A crackdown targeting Somalis

Trump’s immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota have focused on the Somali community in Minneapolis-St. Bol district, the largest in the country.

Trump described Somalis in Minnesota as “trash” and said he did not want them in the United States

About 84,000 of the 260,000 Somalis in the United States live in Minneapolis-St. Paul area. The vast majority of them are American citizens. Approximately 58% were born in the United States and 87% of those born foreign are naturalized citizens.

Of those running schemes to obtain money for child nutrition, housing services and autism programs, 82 of the 92 defendants are Somali-Americans, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota.

Republicans have tried to blame Walz

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee, said fraud will not be tolerated and that his administration “will continue to work with federal partners to ensure fraud is stopped and fraudsters are caught.”

Fraud could be a major issue in the 2026 gubernatorial race as Walz seeks a third term.

Walz said a review scheduled by late January would give a better picture of the extent of the fraud, but he allowed the $1 billion estimate to be accurate. He said his administration was taking strict measures to prevent further fraud. He has long defended how his administration responded.

Minnesota’s leading Somali American lawmaker, Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, urged people not to blame an entire community for the actions of a relatively few.