LIZ PEEK: Massive Minnesota welfare heist proves Democrats can't police their own mess

The monolithic Somali-orchestrated payment fraud successful Minnesota grew truthful big, adjacent the New York Times had to screen it.

The takeaways are delicious: an indictment of sloppy Democrat-run Big Government, a repudiation of migration policies that favour groups that diminution to assimilate and that successful immoderate cases clasp anti-U.S. sentiment and exposing Governor Tim Walz for the lightweight helium is. 

Over respective years, a cabal of (mostly) Somali refugees successful Minnesota pulled disconnected a elephantine heist of the state’s funds, embarrassing Democrat officials and highlighting erstwhile again the fraud that permeates our payment programs. It was a theft truthful mammoth that hundreds of employees of the   Minnesota Department of Human Services wrote anonymously connected X that Walz, who served arsenic  Vice President Kamala Harris' moving mate successful 2024, "has failed Minnesota" and added, "Tim Walz is 100% liable for monolithic fraud successful Minnesota." 

MINNESOTA GOVERNMENT WORKERS BLAME WALZ FOR 'MASSIVE FRAUD' AMID ALLEGATIONS AGAINST SOMALI COMMUNITY

No wonderment the wide media has been mostly mute astir the multiyear ungraded that the Times describes arsenic "staggering successful its standard and brazenness," and that resulted successful the nonaccomplishment of much than$1 cardinal of payer funds. That’s arsenic much, the Times notes, arsenic Minnesota spends annually connected its Department of Corrections.

Most apt the Times would not person weighed successful connected the ungraded if not for the communicative published successful the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal past period by writers Ryan Thorpe and Christopher Rufo, who claimed that immoderate of the funds stolen from Minnesota’s payment programs had gone to money al-Shabab, a Somali violent organization. The Times dismisses that charge, penning that "there has been nary coagulated grounds to substantiate it, and nary of the national fraud cases person featured a nexus to terrorism." Rufo and Thorpe assertion otherwise, quoting 1 confidential root arsenic telling them, "The largest funder of Al-Shabaab is the Minnesota taxpayer."

The Times was besides apt pushed to study connected the ungraded by President Donald Trump, who denounced the theft of payment funds connected Truth Social, penning "Minnesota, nether Governor Walz, is simply a hub of fraudulent wealth laundering activity." He further raged, "Somali gangs are terrorizing the radical of that large State, and BILLIONS of Dollars are missing. Send them backmost to wherever they came from. It’s OVER! President DJT." 

TREASURY SECRETARY LAUNCHES PROBE INTO MINNESOTA TAX DOLLARS ALLEGEDLY FUNDING AL-SHABAAB TERRORISTS

In addition, President Trump announced helium would beryllium terminating the Temporary Protected Status for Somalis successful Minnesota. There are immoderate 76,000 radical of Somali ancestry successful the state, galore of whom received impermanent protected presumption erstwhile they immigrated to the U.S. during the civilian warfare successful the 1990s. Apparently, determination are lone 705 enrolled successful the TPS programme today. 

The scandal, erstwhile thought to beryllium yet different "one-off maltreatment during a wellness emergency" arsenic the Times puts it, has been nether probe by national prosecutors since the aboriginal days of the pandemic. So far, they person charged 86 radical with committing felonies and convicted 59. All but 8 are Somalis.

There were astatine slightest 3 schemes carried retired to defraud Minnesota authorities. The archetypal was nether the umbrella of a children’s meals programme called "Feeding Our Future." The non-profit teamed up with section Somali-owned businesses, supposedly feeding tens of thousands of children, but, successful reality, submitting bogus reimbursement claims and defrauding the state. In 2021, Feeding Our Future received astir $200 cardinal successful funding.

TIM WALZ FIRES BACK AT TRUMP ACCUSATION OF 'INCOMPETENCE,' DODGES ON RESPONSIBILITY FOR FRAUD IN MINNESOTA

Feeding Our Future was not the lone transgression endeavor illegally draining Minnesota’s payment piggy bank. Another strategy stole federally funded wellness attraction benefits from the state’s Housing Stability Services Program. That inaugural was designed to assistance seniors and radical struggling with intelligence wellness problems and addiction to find housing. 

Instead, the fraudsters recovered radical who mightiness person been eligible for the programme from facilities similar rehab centers and submitted fake reimbursement claims connected their behalf.  Initially predicted to outgo immoderate $2.6 cardinal per year, the claims soared from $21 cardinal successful 2021 to $104 cardinal past year.

MINNESOTA TAXPAYER DOLLARS FUNNELED TO AL-SHABAAB TERROR GROUP, REPORT ALLEGES

As helium charged 8 radical with ligament fraud successful September, Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson said, "I privation to beryllium wide connected the scope of the crisis.  What we spot are schemes stacked upon schemes, draining resources meant for those successful need... I person spent my vocation arsenic a fraud authoritative and the extent of the fraud successful Minnesota takes my enactment away…" 

Perhaps the cruelest of the thefts was progressive a perpetrator named Asha Farhan Hassan, who targeted a Minnesota Health Care Program offering aesculapian services to young radical with autism.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINION

As described by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, "Hassan and her partners approached parents successful the Somali assemblage to enlistee their children…Where a kid did not person an autism diagnosis and an idiosyncratic attraction plan, HASSAN and her partners worked with a QSP to get the recruited kid qualified for autism services." 

The fraudsters allegedly paid parents kickbacks of astir $300 to $1,500 per month. In all, prosecutors say, Hassan and her partners successful transgression raked successful immoderate $14 million, immoderate of which she utilized to bargain spot successful Kenya.

Why didn’t Minnesota authorities ace down sooner connected the blatant theft? Reportedly they were acrophobic of offending the Somali community, which constitutes a coagulated voting bloc for Walz and his Democrat colleagues. As 1 section person enactment it, "If you don’t triumph the Somali community, you can’t triumph Minneapolis. And if you don’t triumph Minneapolis, you can’t triumph the state. End of story."

In 2020, erstwhile Minnesota officials raised questions astir Feed Our Future’s alarming expansion, the alleged crooks sued, charging radical discrimination. Of course.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

This is not the archetypal lawsuit of Democrats ignoring maltreatment of our generous payment programs. In summation to warring DOGE bony and nail, respective bluish states person refused successful caller months to crook implicit accusation astir nutrient stamp oregon Social Security benefits, preventing the national authorities from investigating allegations of fraud. It is unconscionable.

Maybe the blatant theft exposed successful Minneapolis volition marque taxpayers request much accountability. Maybe they will, astatine the least, contradict Tim Walz a 3rd word arsenic governor.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM LIZ PEEK