Minnesota: The $9 Billion Heist (Part 1)
How the Most Progressive State in America Became the Fraud Capital of American Healthcare
A restaurant in Minneapolis called Safari.
Seats 35 people.
Claimed to serve 18,000 meals a day to hungry children.
The federal government paid them for every single one.
The children didn’t exist.
The meals didn’t exist.
The money did.
And it’s gone.
Senator Amy Klobuchar posted: “The time for talk is over, the time for action is now. If Congressional Republicans don’t act to extend the health care tax credits by next week, millions of Americans will see their premiums double or even triple.”
She’s blaming Republicans for healthcare costs. Despite federal probes already under way into the $9 billion fraud scandal, she remains focused on the partisan debate. Meanwhile, in her home state of Minnesota:
$9 billion has been stolen from Medicaid and federal nutrition programs under Governor Tim Walz’s watch, the largest coordinated fraud in American history (United States v. Feeding Our Future, No. 21-CR-00123).
78 defendants have been charged. Over 50 have been convicted. Federal prosecutors say the money bought luxury cars, real estate in Kenya and Turkey, and may have funded the Somali terrorist group al-Shabaab.
480 state employees have accused Walz of ignoring early warnings and retaliating against whistleblowers.
The House Oversight Committee has launched an investigation. The Treasury Department is investigating. The FBI has been raiding buildings across Minneapolis for the past 3 years.
And Amy Klobuchar wants to talk about Republican healthcare policy.
This is the story of how the most “progressive” state in America became the fraud capital of American healthcare, and how its three most prominent Democrats are now scrambling to explain what happened on their watch.
The Heist
It started with children’s meals.
In April 2020, as COVID-19 shut down schools across Minnesota, a nonprofit called Feeding Our Future began signing up sites to distribute free meals to hungry children. The federal program paid between $3 and $12 per meal. Feeding Our Future would sponsor the sites, handle the paperwork, and take a cut of the reimbursements.
The growth was extraordinary. In 2019, Feeding Our Future received $3.4 million from the program. By 2021, that number had exploded to $198 million, a 5,700% increase in two years.
The meals were fake. The children were fake. The whole operation was a fraud.
Federal prosecutors allege that Feeding Our Future recruited individuals to open fake meal distribution sites throughout Minnesota. These sites submitted fraudulent attendance rosters with the names of children who didn’t exist, claiming to serve thousands of meals per day to communities that were never fed.
One site, the Safari Restaurant in downtown Minneapolis, supposedly served 18,000 meals per day. The restaurant seats 35 people.
Where did the money go? Luxury cars. Designer clothing. Real estate in Minnesota, Kenya, and Turkey. Federal investigators meticulously untangled a web of financial transactions that spanned continents. Using bank-wire subpoena timelines, they discovered that millions were funneled overseas. Some of these funds, pushed through a trail of shell companies and fake charities, were ultimately traced to al-Shabaab, the Somali terrorist organization responsible for killing Americans.
Federal prosecutors estimate that Feeding Our Future was responsible for a theft of approximately $250-300 million. This figure is based on current prosecutorial assessments and pending court verdicts.
The Fraud Metastasized
As federal investigators continued their investigation, they discovered that Feeding Our Future wasn’t an isolated case. The same playbook—and often the same people—had been used to loot other Minnesota programs.
Housing Stabilization Services
Minnesota launched this first-of-its-kind Medicaid program in 2020 to help seniors and people with disabilities find housing—initial cost estimate: $2.6 million per year.
Actual cost in 2024: $107 million, a 4,000% overrun. Originally the program was intended to serve a specific small population with low-cost needs. To provide a clearer picture, the number of claims surged from approximately 800 to over 32,000, illustrating the sheer scale of exploitation and mismanagement within the program.
Acting U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson told reporters that the “vast majority” of the program was fraudulent. Providers acquired names from addiction treatment centers and submitted fake claims for services never rendered. The program had such low barriers to entry and light recordkeeping requirements that it attracted what prosecutors call “fraud tourism”—criminals from other states relocating to Minnesota to exploit it.
In October 2025, Minnesota shut down the entire program. Thirteen people were charged.
Autism Services (EIDBI)
Medicaid claims for autism services in Minnesota went from $3 million in 2018 to $399 million in 2023. The number of autism service companies exploded from 41 to 328.
One in 16 Somali four-year-olds in Minnesota was supposedly diagnosed with autism, a rate more than triple the state average. Unqualified individuals provided therapy. Providers paid cash kickbacks to parents who enrolled their children, billing Medicaid for treatment that was never delivered.
One parent, who wished to remain anonymous, recalled feeling trapped by the promise of quick money. ‘I was told it was harmless, just paperwork,’ they said. ‘But later, seeing my child’s name on fake records made me realize how deep this went.’
Some billed for therapy sessions while their “therapists” were in Kenya or Turkey. One billed for 23 hours of therapy in a single day.
The FBI raided autism centers across Minneapolis in 2024. Charges are ongoing.
Integrated Community Supports
Providers rented apartments to disabled adults, then billed for full support services that were never delivered—one provider alone: $1.1 million. The FBI raided the operation in December. Seventeen providers suspended.
Non-Emergency Medical Transportation
One building in Minneapolis has 14 home healthcare companies registered at the same address. Another building in St. Paul has 22. The state has 1,020 non-emergency medical transportation companies registered. More than 800 are Somali-owned.
Minnesota never checks if the rides actually happen. They pay the invoices.
Thompson’s estimate for total fraud across all programs: $9 billion.
Of the $18 billion billed to 14 high-risk, state-run Medicaid programs since 2018, “half or more” is potentially fraudulent.
“The fraud is not small. It isn’t isolated. The magnitude cannot be exaggerated,” Thompson said at a December 2025 press conference. “What we see in Minnesota is not a handful of bad actors committing crimes. It’s a staggering, industrial-scale fraud. It’s swamping Minnesota and calling into question everything we know about our state.” This revelation is a wake-up call for every resident who cares about the integrity of our community. Contact your local legislators and demand transparency and accountability. Advocate for thorough audits and systemic reforms. Only by taking action can we hope to restore trust and prevent future exploitation.
The Quality “Learing” Center
If you want to understand how thoroughly the state failed, look no further than the Quality Learing Center.
Yes, “Learing.” Misspelled on their own sign.
This Minneapolis daycare received $1.2 million in public funds in 2024 alone.
The Minnesota Department of Human Services investigated the center 47 different times since May 2021. They documented over 100 violations.
State officials physically visited the location. They observed its condition. They catalogued the violations.
The government continued to approve payments to the daycare despite the blatant red flags. A specific case detailed an inspector visiting the Quality Learing Center and ignoring the crumbling state of the facility, dismissing the violations with a quick signature.
The inspector shuffled through the paperwork, marking it approved, even though the reports clearly pointed to over 100 violations. ‘Just another box to tick,’ they muttered, as they processed yet another day of dysfunction. Meanwhile, funds kept flowing unimpeded, a testament to the larger bureaucratic malaise.
What Did Walz Know?
The Minnesota Department of Education saw the preliminary warning signs.
In the summer of 2020, just months after the fraud began, MDE officials contacted the U.S. Department of Agriculture with concerns about Feeding Our Future’s rapid growth. A whistleblower inside MDE alerted supervisors to a 1,900% spike in meal counts, kickbacks, and shell companies.
In March 2021, MDE issued a “stop pay” notice, withholding all federal funds from Feeding Our Future.
Then Feeding Our Future sued.
The nonprofit filed a lawsuit alleging that MDE’s actions constituted racial discrimination against minority-operated companies. It was 2020. Everything was racist.
MDE resumed payments.
Governor Walz has blamed a Ramsey County judge for ordering the payments to continue. But Judge John Guthmann issued a rare public statement denying that he ever made such a ruling. The payments, he said, were “made voluntarily” by the state after Feeding Our Future claimed it had resolved the deficiencies.
The FBI didn’t raid Feeding Our Future until January 2022, nearly two years after the fraud began, and more than a year after MDE first tried to stop payments.
In July 2021, while the fraud was ongoing, Gov. Walz personally awarded an “Outstanding Refugee Award” to a fraudster from another nonprofit linked to the scheme.
The Whistleblowers
On November 30, 2025, an account claiming to represent 480 employees of the Minnesota Department of Human Services posted a devastating accusation:
“Tim Walz is 100% responsible for massive fraud in Minnesota. We let Tim Walz know of fraud early on, hoping for a partnership in stopping fraud, but no, we got the opposite response. Tim Walz systematically retaliated against whistleblowers using monitoring, threats, repression, and did his best to discredit fraud reports.”
The post garnered nearly 37 million views before the account was suspended. It was later restored.
The whistleblowers allege that agency leaders appointed by Walz “willfully disregarded rules and laws to keep fraud reports quiet—even to the extent of threatening families of whistleblowers.”
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer’s investigation letter to Walz states: “Whistleblowers have indicated that DHS employees are destroying evidence.”
The letter also references something even more explosive:
“You were caught on tape pledging to help Feeding Our Future fraudsters in a conversation that also included discussion of campaign donations from Somali community leaders to secure your donor base and, only days later, you and your son accepted contributions to your campaigns from the individuals in this meeting.” Authorities are reportedly determining the authenticity and availability of the alleged tape, which has become a critical element in assessing the claims against the governor. The current status of this evidence in legal proceedings remains unclear, inviting readers to critically assess the claim’s credibility.
The System Was Designed to Fail
The fraud scandal is shocking. But it’s not surprising.
Minnesota’s healthcare and social services infrastructure has been systematically weakened by the same progressive ideology that claims to champion the vulnerable.
The Housing Stabilization Services program was designed with “low barriers to entry” and “minimal requirements for reimbursement.” The stated goal was to make it easy for small organizations to serve at-risk groups.
The actual result: Anyone could sign up, submit fake claims, and collect millions.
When the state tried to stop paying Feeding Our Future in 2021, they got sued for racism.
They folded. This is what happens when ‘equity’ becomes the organizing principle of government. Oversight becomes oppression. Verification becomes discrimination. Responsibility turns into racism.
To counteract this systemic failure, implementing safeguards such as third-party audits or randomized verification processes could be prudent. These measures would enhance oversight without compromising equity, ensuring that the pursuit of an inclusive system does not open the floodgates to exploitation.
U.S. Attorney Thompson put it plainly: “This fraud crisis didn’t come out of nowhere. It’s the result of widespread failure across nearly every level of leadership in Minnesota: Politicians who turned a blind eye. Agencies that failed to act. Prosecutors and law enforcement who didn’t push hard enough. Reporters who ignored the story. Community leaders who stayed silent. And a public that wanted to believe it couldn’t happen here.”
It happened here in the most progressive state in America.
But the fraud is only half the story.
Tomorrow: The 40-year-old law that turned Minnesota’s hospitals into a protected cartel, and the nonprofit racket that made their executives rich while patients can’t find a bed.
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The cartel counts on complexity to hide in plain sight.
Sunlight is the only disinfectant.
-Rojas out
Your conclusions are spot on.
We believe what’s happened in Minnesota is happening in most states, even “red” ones. Anytime you have public (i.e. government) / private / NGO partnerships, fraud can explode as it did in Minnesota.
Every state and federal legislator should re-examine all such partnerships and either defund and dissolve them (our preference) or audit the heck out of them.
Follow the money, find the fraud.
Excellent, as usual! If that much fraud has been found in ONE state, well … we could all afford free healthcare if the system was gutted in all states. Start with the big 3 PBMs! 😎