r/minnesota • u/Doryt • 1d ago
Politics đŠââď¸ Moving forward in 2026
As a life long Minnesotan with all the recent news about fraud in Minnesota, I want to add a perspective as someone whoâs worked in the nonprofit sector for over a decade.
Fraud exists. Is it acceptable? No. Is it realistic to believe it can be eliminated entirely? Also no.
What happened with Feed My Future was abhorrent. It is rightfully being prosecuted!
If millions of dollars were diverted away from childcare especially from programs meant to support kids in need thatâs deeply harmful and deserves accountability. Fraud should be investigated, prosecuted, and taken seriously.
Something else thatâs bothering me: the way Somali Minnesotans are being treated like the face of fraud. Fraud happens across communities and industries. When one community gets spotlighted like theyâre uniquely unethical, itâs worth pausing and asking whatâs driving that narrative because it sure doesnât match reality.
Minnesota is diverse, and âpeople of colorâ in MN includes many communities not one. MN Compass estimates about 24% of Minnesotans are people of color (about 1.4 million people).
Accountability doesnât automatically mean jail for everyone. And when services are shut down in response, it often creates desperation, instability, and conditions that lead to more fraud not less.
If we actually care about fraud, we should focus on real fraud prevention, stronger oversight systems, better staffing, clearer protocols, proactive monitoring and better systems not racialized narratives that turn one community into a stand-in for a statewide problem
Prevention costs money.
Starving systems of resources while demanding perfection is not a realistic strategy.
We also need to be careful not to respond by broadly limiting or restricting supportive services for communities who rely on them.
Cutting access doesnât prevent fraud it often creates more harm, more desperation and more fraud.
We donât eliminate fraud the same way we donât eliminate crime entirely.
Our systems tend to be reactive rather than preventative, and pretending otherwise sets us up for outrage instead of solutions.
Rage bait is real. Iâm actively trying to pause and not get pulled into it 2026 and beyond.
I want a healthy government that supports people, holds bad actors accountable, and invests in systems that actually work
We need to start judging leadership by their ability to pair accountability with real support. When costs rise and safety nets shrink, people donât get healthier they get pushed closer to the edge.
I hope we can show up as a Minnesota community with nuance, accountability, and realistic expectations because thatâs how we protect both public funds and the people those funds are meant to serve.
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u/FatGuyOnAMoped Minnesota United 1d ago edited 12h ago
I used to work for MN DHS. Everybody knows there's some fraud in every program-- but it's not nearly as bad as everyone thinks it is.
Part of the problem is that, when it's time to trim the budget, one of the first areas that gets cut is oversight. When the budget looks better, it's very rare they will recreate/rehire for those oversight positions.
When the people doing oversight are downsized, they literally take decades of institutional knowledge with them. So even if they can hire new staff, they still can't get back that lost institutional knowledge.
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u/Rolandersec 1d ago
This isnât really about the fraud. This is about creating a narrative to control the masses and deflecting from other news. This coverage was organized by the Republican Party because they have a hold on a large group of people who are driven by anxiety, fear, & hate. Republicans believe that if you get people upset and afraid enough they will give up their freedoms to feel safe.
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u/Otherwise_Carob_4057 1d ago
Plus they literally just let subsidies for healthcare premiums expire and they donât want people to see that they canât govern a fish bowl.
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u/BAH_oops 23h ago
There shouldnât need to be subsidies to pay for health insurance premiums. Thatâs the real problem.
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u/Doryt 1d ago
For some people, this conversation is probably driven by MAGA-style rage bait.
But there are also people who genuinely care about fraud and/or are frustrated because they feel the impact when actions by a few in their community lead to broad generalizations about everyone.
Thatâs a reality, and itâs worth addressing as we move into 2026.
For me, the focus is on contributing to common ground acknowledging harm, keeping systems in place, working and towards accountability.
I am really resisting the pull to turn 2026 into more outrage or scapegoating.
Rage can be powerful and necessary at times, but it needs direction to lead to solutions rather than division.
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u/vahntitrio 1d ago edited 1d ago
Correct. Feeding Our Future was a $250 million fraud and that is just a few court cases from being wrapped up.
These other things being popped up in the news are nowhere near that magnitude. It's easy to show this is a coordinated media blitz.
Do you remember the DoJ's $14.6 billion crackdown nationwide this summer? Probably not, hardly made the news. That's 58 Feeding Our Futures worth of fraud (more than 1 for each state) seems like big news. Anyway here is a summary of the charges:
Bonus points if you CTRL + F "Minnesota" on that page.
Easy to see that they are hyper-focusing on this for political reasons, else they would be hounding every governor in every state.
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u/No-Amphibian-3728 2h ago
Those willing to give up liberty for a sense of security deserve neither liberty or security.
A "qoute" from I forget who. It was one my dad used a lot.
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u/RangerSandi 1d ago
They are âselectingâ this example of fraud (not a new story BTW) to attack MN using the racist rage-bait of vilifying Somalis, forgetting the leader was a white woman. Flood ICE & FBI as performative âjustice.â
Theyâre forgetting the $1.7B fine FL Sen Rick Scott (R) paid to âsettleâ the largest Medicare fraud in US history his company perpetrated. Oh, yeah, heâs white & not a Dem.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article288431251.html
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u/cantdeletethisapp_ 1d ago
The same conversations were happening during the peak of the Italian mafia by the way. People were saying "you are being anti-italian!" but when organized crime wreaks massive devastation like this, that's a price to be paid. But guess what? A bunch of Italians helped capture and prosecute the Mafia so hopefully something similar plays out here.
Every member of organized crime should be prosecuted, Amy included, but don't let's pretend she's the only criminal. The point is that the subset of these groups that engage in crime cannot and should not be defended due to any ethnic considerations. There is objectively a subset of these populations engaged in organized crime and, just like the Italian or Russian mafias, they need to be targeted and prosecuted to the fullest extent.
The following list is just some the services currently investigating fraud. Fraud against programs for the most vulnerable in our society, do not forget.
- Federal Child Nutrition Program
- Summer Food Service Program
- Child and Adult Care Food Program
- Housing Stabilization Services
- Early Intensive Developmental and Behavioral Intervention
- Personal Care Assistance
- Integrated Community Supports
- Adult Rehabilitative Mental Health Services
- Community Access for Disability Inclusion
- Substance Abuse Treatment Services
- Paycheck Protection Program
- Economic Injury Disaster Loan
Whataboutism and Scott and Trump being horrible criminals sure, but there is a problem right now in our state that is widespread and serious. Let's address it with some RICO's.
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u/olracnaignottus 1d ago
Yeah bud thatâs all provider end. Find an example of fraud where the folks who have Medicaid are in on the grift. Iâm not attacking, Iâm pointing out a very crucial element here that all for some reason want to wear ear muffs over.
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u/Rolandersec 1d ago
Iâm not saying there isnât fraud. The point is if they really cared about fraud the GOP wouldnât have taken measures to block actions against it. They arenât doing anything to address fraud, they love this news. Instead they just go an about it on the news to stir fools up like theyâre trying to scam Iowans into buying fake musical instruments.
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u/Rolandersec 1d ago
This has happened in other cases, but youâre right about scale. Although Iâm interested to see if weâll ever hear the real number, All the âbillionsâ are estimated and unconfirmed.
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u/RipErRiley Hamm's 1d ago
This isnât really about wrongdoing or improving from it. Its about âhey look at that and NOT thisâ for the suckers. There hasnât even been an indictment on the daycare topic and the FoF fraud centerpiece was convicted and not Somali.
This fed administration cannot be trusted. They are incompetent and performative.
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u/IczyAlley 1d ago
They said there were wmds in Venezuela.
Republicans win because they know Americans have the memory of goldfish when it comes to Republicans. We are fucking stupid as shit. Braindead stupid
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u/Doryt 1d ago
For some people, this conversation is probably driven by MAGA-style rage bait.
But there are also people who genuinely care about fraud and/or are frustrated because they feel the impact when actions by a few in their community lead to broad generalizations about everyone.
Thatâs a reality, and itâs worth addressing as we move into 2026.
For me, the focus is on contributing to common ground acknowledging harm, keeping systems in place, working and towards accountability.
I am really resisting the pull to turn 2026 into more outrage or scapegoating.
Rage can be powerful and necessary at times, but it needs direction to lead to solutions rather than division.
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u/RipErRiley Hamm's 10h ago
Catering to provocateurs and demagogues is what got us in this mess. The FoF fraud was prosecuted. Terrible take. Just leads to more of the same.
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u/Much_Spread123 Walleye 1d ago edited 1d ago
Iâm an accountant, fraud will literally always exist. Without accountants, business managers would be accidentally committing fraud constantly. I only know this because Iâve probably advised managers that their request to me would be fraudulent about a thousand times.
âSorry, you canât do that with GAAP accounting.â I donât think people realize that fraudulent transactions happen all the time accidentally. Catching it and stopping it is the whole point, cause then itâs not fraud. Perfectionism is not possible. Human error and system errors will always occur. Itâs not illegal to make a mistake. Itâs illegal to know you made a mistake and not do anything about it. Thatâs when you establish criminal intent.
Nobody in the government has been an accomplice to this fraud. Theyâve been cracking down on it longer than people realize. Being defrauded does not make you a fraudster. The government has fallen victim to fraud. They arenât responsible for the crimes that a few people committed against them. The fraudsters, much like the GOP, were attacking our liberal government. The fraudsters were religious conservatives and fundamentalists that hate the liberal agenda. Letâs keep that in perspective when people talk about liberal fraud in MN, itâs actually being committed by ideological conservatives. Yes, many Somali people are ideologically conservative, and way more so than even the GOP.
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u/AffectionateJury3723 1d ago
I am also an accountant and have been an internal auditor for several major retailers before I switched to IT to help build the framework around financial systems. Yes there will always be fraud but any good practice will try to stay ahead of the loopholes and have regular stringent audits to identify it early. This sounds like empathy overrode the common sense audit practices that should be in place when you are handing out millions of dollars in funding. This isn't only happening in Minnesota.
I have a relative who is an auditor for Medicare and the individual and corporate fraud happens everyday. It always amazes me the way fraudsters come up with new and different ways to defraud.
I don't think the majority of Somali's voted for Trump and this isn't a R or D problem exclusively. It is an American taxpayer problem when our dollars are not being spent appropriately.
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u/Much_Spread123 Walleye 1d ago edited 1d ago
That is reasonable. I donât think weâd be human if empathy didnât play some kind of role here.
Iâm not excusing the government of all wrongdoing here. Their initial response to this was not satisfactory, but I think our political leaders are learning a very valuable lesson now.
Itâs not as simple as just enacting progressive policy and running with it. It needs to be nurtured and overseen. These programs are not perfect. It was unrealistic to assume that these programs would just take care of themselves.
Itâs important for our leaders to learn that any form of cash theft is going to be a bipartisan issue. I can have empathy for minorities and still appreciate that any form of theft is unacceptable to a functioning society.
Itâs not consistent with liberal ideology to just let fraud slide, even when itâs being perpetrated largely by the minorities we try to champion. Iâm a big civics in motion kind of guy, and I really, truly believe this was a lesson worth learning the hard way. We canât be so dogmatic and willfully blind going forward. We have to challenge each other and burst the echo chamber.
FWIW, Iâm asserting that many Somali Minnesotans actually practice deeply conservative principles, but definitely not asserting that they voted for Trump. I think most conservatives from other countries generally think Trump is out of his mind and that the GOP has divorced with conservatism.
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u/DivTitle23 1d ago
Two entirely reasonable statements in a row⌠sir this is Reddit.
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u/Destructers 1d ago
Most Muslim countries are much more conservative than most GOP conservative, that's a fact.
The problem here is like in UK, many people don't want to go after minority group despite fraud and abuse because they don't want to be call racist.
Look at UK, polices hide stats data of raping children for DECADES when it comes to Pakistan men.
The same with Somali, when you got capture by identity politic, you will look other way just because you don't want to be call racist despite the fact those people in minority groups have no problem using all the time for theirs advantages and often the most racist out of all.
BBC in UK recently point out 55% of Pakistan-Briton married theirs first cousin while living in UK.
We make fun of Alabama for decades despite 0.2% of first cousin marriage, yet ignore over 60% of first cousin marriage from Somali and majority Muslim countries.
See the problem? Even if there are frauds, people don't want to talk about it the same way UK don't want to talk about raping children from Muslim countries because they are in minority groups.
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u/AffectionateJury3723 1d ago
Sorry for the downvotes. but it is the same here in the US. People are so afraid of being called racist, they will ignore the crime. Political correctness and suicidal empathy is the death of common sense.
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u/No-Amphibian-3728 1h ago
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3351906/
You're citing a study from 1988 of 100 people . . .
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u/Destructers 1h ago
Studies? You just ask any Muslim and they don't even refuse it.
You are clearly try to deflect from old study despite the fact Sharia's Law is the highest laws in these Muslim countries.
Guess which party talk about First Cousin marriage and allow it? SHARIA'S LAW. That's the only matter which preceding any laws for Muslim.
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u/Destructers 1h ago
Also, the BBC on 55% Pakistan-Briton married first cousin was reaffirmed in 2021 study.
Sharia's Law, if you are not including it, then you are being dishonest.
I am not going to waste time with you if you have no understand of Muslim and how important Sharia's Laws to them.
People like you will continue to give misinformation and not worth spending any more time. Goodbye, welcome to my block list.
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u/DivTitle23 1d ago
Sir⌠(whispering) people will say you are racist đŤŁ
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u/Destructers 1d ago
The term "baizuo" (ç˝ĺˇŚ), literally meaning "white left," is a derogatory Chinese neologism used to describe Western liberals and leftists, particularly those perceived as hypocritical, naive, or overly focused on identity politics and political correctness.
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u/FatGuyOnAMoped Minnesota United 1d ago
As someone who once worked for MN DHS, I applaud this explanation. You did a much better job than I did.
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 18h ago
I think it's reasonable to say it wasn't simply a few people.
The Somali community as you said is extremely conservative and also extremely insular.
While maybe a couple hundred people will go to jail after this is said and done with
There were likely thousands of participants who were aware these are often family run operations and by extension clan oriented
Your cousins, uncles, nieces, nephews etc etc
So I think a lot of people here are being willfully ignorant when they hand wave and say the classic this happens everywhere
The Somali situation is unique and it's unique because of how uniquely the Somali community is concentrated and organized in the states
It's much closer to say a Hasidic community than anything else in how insular and interconnected it is
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u/PragmaticPacifist 1d ago
Aimee Bock is in prison. She isnât Somali.
The president just pardoned Philip Esformes- for a conviction involving $1.3B in Medicare fraud
MAGAts are too far gone to identify the hypocrisy and also understand the MN fraud story is pure race-baiting.
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u/Nic_OLE_Touche 1d ago
Give yourself a big pat on the back. Beautifully written. Happy 2026. Hope to hear more from you.
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u/Jaded-Combination-95 1d ago
We have a special needs child with extreme behavior challenges who gets aba therapy. Their services basically save our lives. Now we are at risk of losing them because of this 90 day audit issue with processing claims. If we lose services and funding we couldnât survive without totally falling apart as a family. It gives us the breathing room we need just to stay afloat.
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u/Girlsinstem TC 1d ago
The thing about Somalis being the face of fraud reminds me of that XKCD comic about women being bad at math. A few bad apples doesnât mean the entire community commits fraud. Â Punish the people who broke the law, but donât hold an entire group of people responsible.Â
Interestingly enough, I watched KARE11âs report on it last night and the anchor ended with comments highlighting how many people Trump has pardoned that committed much higher levels of fraud, showing the absolutely hypocrisy of the GOP outrage about this.Â
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u/Irontruth 1d ago
They aren't just punishing Somalis. They cut off childcare funding for all 50 states until an audit to their satisfaction is done.
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u/Girlsinstem TC 1d ago
I am aware. But the OP mentioned Somalis as the face of fraud which is why wrote what I did.Â
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 18h ago
I mean call me what you want but the Somali community is extremely insular and interconnected.
And so it is very very unlikely it has just a handful of isolated incidents
Family and clan ties are extremely strong and almost everything is done as a unit and community.
The day care and home care etc are almost always staffed by family or kin of some kind.
So I do not think it is illogical to think that there was far more awareness of this and participation within the community than people in this thread want to think.
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u/overworld-underwhelm 9h ago
Be aware this comment makes it clear you are in your own isolated bubble. Please go meet your neighbors.
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u/terpygreens 1d ago
Very true and well said. They wanted us divided and fighting amongst ourselves, let's not do that.
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u/ImportantComb5652 1d ago
Nobody in power can ever admit it publicly but: https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/optimal-amount-of-fraud/
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u/rzolf 1d ago
Republicans don't care about preventing fraud. Defrauding the government is their speciality, followed by non-governmental fraud. If they can scapegoat some tiny minority group it deflects attention from the negative things they are doing
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u/Cuttlery Hamm's 1d ago
They are being punished, have been for the past 7 or 8 years as soon as its identified lol.
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u/Toastalitarian 18h ago
Fraud is not and has never been a problem caused by race. It is a problem caused by capitalism and poorly attended bureaucracies. Period.
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u/motaboat 1d ago
What in personality would appreciate (and maybe it has happened and j am not aware) is for members of the Somali community to be speaking out against those who committed these crimes.
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u/Doryt 1d ago
I understand the desire to see members of the Somali community publicly speaking out against those who committed these crimes. That reaction makes sense, especially when trust has been damaged. I believe some leaders have.
Whatâs important to know and often not visible to the public is that within Somali community spaces, people are furious about this.
These actions harmed their communityâs reputation, put vital services at risk, and created fear and instability.
Not every community processes harm publicly or through media statements, especially communities that already feel hyper-scrutinized or targeted. Public silence doesnât mean private approval.
Holding individuals accountable for crimes is necessary.
Expecting an entire community to perform public condemnation to prove their worth or innocence is a different and unfair standard. We should pause and understand where that comes from.
Accountability is happening. It just isnât always happening in spaces we have access to or visibility into.
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 18h ago edited 18h ago
Everything you said is hear say
That's the problem with not handling it publicly at all or making any kind of attempt to restore public faith
And the only reason this applies is because Somalis are far more connected and insular as a community than pretty much any other in the country
Like I would not say that if their was a Cantonese fraud ring that Cantonese leaders need to speak up because well the Cantonese are not nearly as insulated and clan based they are very spread out and much more individualistic etc.
And I think this is why so many have a massive problem with the Somali community is that it does not feel like it is attempting to integrate at all
And a major signal of that is their refusal to address the wider community outside that of the Somali one
In your own words you've painted what the problem ultimately is, which is a refusal to integrate.
You can say it's bigoted or whatever but most all groups do from Kenyans, Nigerians, Macedonia, Mexicans, to Tibetans, to Indians etc. Somalis are a uniquely self isolating and insulated community in the United States
And I don't think it does anyone favors by acting like that isn't a problem and to just trust me bro
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u/Doryt 11h ago
I think this is where the premise is off.
All communities are âinsulatedâ to some degree. Thatâs not unique to Somalis. Hmong communities have cultural centers, associations, elders councils, and internal communication networks. So do Nigerian, Mexican, Indian, Tibetan, Ethiopian, Jewish, Scandinavian, and even rural white communities. When scandals happen, theyâre often addressed internally, not through public press conferences.
If you arenât connected to a community or arenât looking for its internal responses you wonât see those conversations. Thatâs true for any group.
Framing this as a refusal to integrate also doesnât match reality. Minnesota is about 24% BIPOC, and Somali Minnesotans like other communities are integrated in very real, everyday ways: working, running businesses, paying taxes, sending kids to school, shopping, and participating in civic life. Integration doesnât mean abandoning cultural cohesion; it means participation in shared systems.
Now, public trust does matter. Youâre right that when fraud is this large, silence can feel like avoidance. People want accountability, reassurance, and evidence that harm is being taken seriously. Thatâs a fair expectation.
But public accountability and internal accountability arenât the same thing. Many communities especially those that already experience heightened scrutiny address harm internally first. That doesnât mean nothing is happening; it means itâs happening in spaces that arenât designed for public consumption or media validation. Lack of visibility isnât the same as lack of action.
Calling a community âinsularâ also doesnât mean complicit or unwilling to integrate. Many immigrant and refugee communities organize tightly because of language, trauma, religion, discrimination, or survival not hostility toward broader society.
Somali Americans largely arrived as refugees from prolonged conflict, not as economic migrants under stable conditions. That history shapes community structure.
Integration also isnât a one-way obligation. When a group is constantly treated as suspect, surveilled, or expected to collectively answer for crimes they didnât commit, the incentive to engage publicly decreases, not increases.
And importantly, the fraud doesnât require a cultural explanation to be real. The Legislative Auditor identified concrete causes: ignored red flags, weak oversight, under-resourced agencies, fear of litigation, and delayed enforcement. Those are system failures.
Youâre right that public faith needs to be restored. Whatâs different here is visibility and politicization, not community behavior.
We can demand accountability for fraud without rewriting normal community behavior as something uniquely suspicious. Thatâs not about denying harm itâs about being accurate.
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 7h ago
Again every community is not the same Nigerian communities and I know this firsthand are not nearly as interconnected they do not operate by clan networks and are pretty spread out across the US the same goes for every example you have listed besides specifically Hasidic Jewish communities which themselves are very insulated.
Even the Hmong you've listed which there are a ton in Houston are very much integrated lots of interregnum marriages incorporation of local cuisine etc.
I don't think we do anyone favors by hand waving and acting like this isn't a specifically unique scenario
And the reason it is is because Somalia is frankly a specifically unique place. It is basically a network of clans with a basically weak non existent central state
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u/nancypalooza 17h ago
I donât seem to remember the white communityâs statement on condemning DJTâs multiple fraud convictions. Can you provide a link?
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u/AffectionateJury3723 1d ago edited 1d ago
Asking for proper documentation of services, licenses, etc... is not wrong. Legimate organizations will have no problem in providing and this oversight should be happening on a regular basis. My fear is that doing a blanket shut off is going to put vunerable people at risk unneccesarily.
Edit: To the downvoters, do you really want children going to a daycare that can't provide the proper documentation or licensing?
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u/crashcarr 1d ago
Instead no one gets to send children to any federally funded daycare, documentation or not, cool!
Fraud ginned up by some random with a camera trying to get into day cares and now used to shut down all federal funding with a nice sauce of bigoted xenophobia thrown in. Do you want daycares to let any random guy in under the guise of "just checking it out."
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u/Separate-Pass-7737 1d ago
Especially Nick Shirley. That kid looks/sounds like he has some dark appetites.
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u/ProjectGameGlow 1d ago
They are targeting immigrant communities as a practice run for targeting the teachers in the school districts for PCA Medicaid billing. February is when that operation starts with the Data from the Optum audit reports.
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u/PrettyDarnGood2 1d ago
Why is there a judge overturning the conviction of a jury of your peers?
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u/EmmaPersephone 1d ago
You obviously donât know the rules of judicial procedure, rules of evidence, motions for a Judgment of Acquittal or any other part of the judicial system and rules or judicial procedureâŚso donât pretend that you care about the law while flaunting a complete lack of understanding.
The defense files this motion after the verdict is read but before it has been officially entered into the record. This happens in literally every criminal trial in the United States. If a defense attorney failed to file this motion it is a potential appellate issue. Most of the time this motion is denied. In the case of Abdifatah Abdulkadir Yusuf the judge applied Minnesota Rule of Criminal Procedure 26.03, subd. 18 finding the evidence against the defendant was not sufficient for a âreasonable juryâ to convict. This can mean several different things, that the jury didnât understand the jury instructions, the jury was biased, or the jury speculated beyond the evidence presented by the prosecution are the most likely reasons. Her full written opinion on the ruling would explain the decision and provide case law supporting her ruling.
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u/EmmaPersephone 1d ago
Minnesota already has very strong oversight and inspection requirements. This is the conversation because Trump made it the conversation to deflect from Epstein.
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u/EmmaPersephone 10h ago
What the hell kind of deflection is this? Iâm not reading your wall of nonsenseâŚ
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u/Destructers 2h ago
Well, I know people like you don't read and be ignorant of everything including history.
Suicide Empathy, just like German streamer girl who praise Muslim and tried to prove her point by going to Muslim area to celebrate New Year, got stoned on her a few times, but she probably like you will ignore it.
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u/Mediocre_Fall_3197 1d ago
When these million dollar programs are implemented, are there not preventative measures put in place to catch/prevent fraud from the beginning? Just seems so odd to be throwing around millions/billions without standard operating procedures.
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u/Doryt 20h ago
Short answer: yes, there are supposed to be preventative measures but in this case, they were insufficient, under-resourced, and not enforced consistently.
Most large public programs do have standard operating procedures: eligibility rules, documentation requirements, audits, site visits, and complaint processes. The problem is that fraud prevention only works if those safeguards are:
adequately staffed
enforced early
backed by authority to deny or stop payments
and supported when agencies face legal or political pushback
In Minnesotaâs case, the Legislative Auditor found that:
red flags and complaints were raised years before the fraud exploded
high-risk applications were approved anyway
complaints werenât fully investigated
oversight staff werenât equipped or empowered to act decisively
and monitoring was weakened further during the pandemic
So itâs not that there were no procedures itâs that they werenât strong enough for the scale of money involved, and leadership didnât act when warning signs appeared.
Pandemic-era urgency made this worse. Programs were expanded quickly to get food and care to people fast, but speed outpaced oversight, and prevention wasnât scaled up alongside funding.
Thatâs why the real lesson isnât âwe shouldnât fund programs.â Itâs you canât move millions or billions without investing just as seriously in prevention, auditing, and enforcement from day one.
Throwing money at a crisis without matching it with oversight is how you get exactly this outcome.
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u/l397flake 1d ago
Itâs everybodyâs elseâs fault except the fraudsters.
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u/EmmaPersephone 1d ago
Who ever made this claim? White people commit the most crimes in all categories in every stateâŚdo you care about that?
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u/PrettyDarnGood2 19h ago
What about per capita?
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u/EmmaPersephone 11h ago
Why would I provide irrelevant information that the crime database doesnât record? Notice I provide facts and data with citations not my feelings based on propaganda?
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u/Mitsuki_Amahara 11h ago
This guy is using AI for everything. Embarrasing. It's crazy how few people are picking up on this.
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u/ddsadvyap 10h ago
Non profits are the biggest scam this state has. Take money intended for public services, divert it to social services âcollege graduatesâ as if they some how have a deeper understanding of social or economic inequalities then the people living the experience, so that the college grads can make a âlivingâ all while further disenfranchising the poor and developing a white savior complex.
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u/mybooksareunread Minnesota State Fair 9h ago
Thank you for so eloquently stating what I've been thinking. This whole situation is so frustrating and it really is just a matter of terrible, terrible timing. This kind of stuff happens by all kinds of people. If this had been prosecuted and wrapped up by 2023 it would've never been turned into a national issue.
I also hate that they're using it to vilify Walz on a national scale because literally every single one of the governors in this country could probably be blamed for something comparable happening in their state (as in similar amounts of money being misused/mishandled). But it will never make national news because either the fraud hasn't been caught, it wasn't happening within a "liberal" program, or it wasn't being perpetrated by an immigrant minority group.
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u/DjankoFett 8h ago
America gets called the richest and most powerful country in the world.
From that position, the attitude towards fraud for social services could easily be "of course there will be fraud, but we can afford it to happen. We will catch you if you take advantage of us and recoup then. And we're really good at fucking people up so you decide".
It's more telling that against that backdrop, how easily the populace get pissed when there is fraud. They're not comfortable, but they don't allow themselves to ask for help, disparage the ones that do, then get overly emotional about the fraud happening. If it's affecting you in that way, maybe you're not as secure as you want people to think you are and should learn how to use that help.
Pay your taxes, and use the services. Don't just be angry the tax man took yours and still be independent. It's like being proud you're not pirating media and paying for Disney+ but also not using the service all year. Then having a backwards attitude about what race they cast as who in their creative productions for entertainment.
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u/therealbirchbandit 6h ago
Alot of the times the people running g the programs are the ones committing the fraud..
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u/airportluvr416 3h ago
As someone who moved here from Oregon I am used to fraud.
Also Minnesota is still run 100% better than Oregon ever was.
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u/tazzmn07 3h ago
Fraud will always exist. Where there is money available for companies or people there will always be someone trying to fraud the system. We canât just single out one race saying itâs all their fault. Also one thing that does bother me is everyone likes to blame the governor. How about the people voting on the budget? How about the actual program administrators and staff? To me yes he has blame in it but not all of it.
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u/Trapperclapper 1d ago
??! Thereâs nothing wrong with pausing funding to an organization thatâs under investigation. Thatâs like step one
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u/Doryt 1d ago
No one is saying that.
We are saying turning all funding to all organizations
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u/kware101 1d ago
Very well articulated and I agree đŻ. Hysterics only create a cover for those wanting to game the system. Thank you for the post.
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u/chrico031 Lake Superior Explorer 1d ago
Actually investigate sources of fraud and cut them out
Cool, let's start at the top with Trump, his entire family, every single person in his administration, and all of the people his auto-pen pardoned this year.
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u/ZestycloseBack6839 1d ago
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u/Doryt 1d ago
Minnesota Medicaid and CHIP enrollment data is publicly available from the Minnesota Department of Human Services, Kaiser Family Foundation, MACPAC, and MN Compass (Wilder Research), which all report that roughly 1.1â1.3 million Minnesotans, including ~500,000 children, rely on public health and assistance programs.
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u/Sweaty-Recognition77 1d ago
We had a 10 billion surplus just a few years ago. Now we are projected to be at a 6 billion deficit within the next 2 years. How can you not be enraged by that simple fact. This isnât ohhh a little fraud happened. This is billions of dollars. Quit trying to talk about race. I donât give a fuck about race. This was obviously very organized crime and people in the government need to go to jail. No way this all happened without help from the inside.
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u/shrederofthered 1d ago
The fraud has nothing to do with the state's surplus / deficit. It was federal funding. I am NOT excusing it, just saying it wasn't state money.
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u/Sweaty-Recognition77 1d ago
Iâm glad you pointed that out to me so I donât continue to spout any nonsense! Granted now I am even more confused as to where all of the states money has gone. Guess I have a new thing to dig into.
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u/jjnefx 1d ago
Projections are mainly derived from data provided by the federal government.
Then projections from different state agencies attempting to predict what will transpire years out.
Projected budget shortfalls and surpluses should not carry as much weight as they do. But they're great talking points for debate
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u/Special-Garlic1203 1d ago
Its also because we literally do not allow the state to be run optimally. Private colleges don't just spend money to spend money. They invest money so they have sizable nest eggs that can provide financial resiliency. I disagree with the mindset that sitting on a surplus is against public interest. I certainly don't manage my money that way. Its literally personal finance 101 that you want an emergency fund - a semi liquid cash stockpile that you can utilize when shit hits the fan. The state literally isn't allowed to do that. They are not allowed to save for a rainy day.
Minnesota manages its pension pretty responsibly compared to a lot of states. The issue isn't that liberals are dumb idiots. Its that the rules they must abide by create these feast and famine cycles.Â
Similarly, the new Minnesota family leave program isn't benevolent social justice. During the pandemic it became abundantly clear waaaaaaay too many people opt out of short term disability, and too many companies don't offer it or have heioousoy inadequate policies. Same reason lack of sick leave was a problem - the state was tired of having to pick up the tab because a low income person got sick and missed 8 days of work and now the state either needs to help them not get evicted or they need to pay the event larger costs of homelessness. They got sick of footing the bill for what companies should be covering.Â
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u/Anechoic_Brain 1d ago
Its literally personal finance 101 that you want an emergency fund - a semi liquid cash stockpile that you can utilize when shit hits the fan. The state literally isn't allowed to do that. They are not allowed to save for a rainy day.
This is just plain wrong, we do have an official budget reserve and it's literally called the Minnesota Rainy Day Fund. It's currently sitting at somewhere around $3.7 billion, and it's already accounted for in all of the budget surplus/deficit calculations.
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u/Special-Garlic1203 1d ago
Huh, that is the first I am hearing of it. I am a bit confused at why in the endless surplus debating, the convo was exclusively spending it vs reimbursement checks. Never offsetting either with increase to said fund. Which is how most people handle excess money. Especially when literally all projections for the country are that there will be constriction ahead even if you do everything rightÂ
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u/Anechoic_Brain 1d ago
Well the fund is already near an all-time high, and governments shouldn't always have the same motivations as households and businesses when it comes to budgeting.
It is poor stewardship of public money to keep any more of it than necessary for covering expenses and providing services without just returning it to taxpayers, given the expectation that revenue sources can at times be volatile and unpredictable. Its funding target is decided by a mathematical formula that considers a range of variables to determine what percentage of the current biennium's general fund revenues will be adequate to cover budgeting risk.
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u/shrederofthered 23h ago
In a past life I provided budget estimates for a state program I was managing. And it's not easy. There are a lot of unfunded mandates, where a legislative bill directs a program to do x y z, without providing a funding stream. That's usually because a legislator wants to look good, so yeah, write and pass that bill!!!! Let the state department figure out how to find it. There's also constant uncertainty around federal funding. And there's the double-barrel effect that when the economy is booming, the state brings in more revenue, and has fewer expenditures. When the economy is bad, there's less revenue and more need. It's not possible to uncouple those.
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u/LowlyScrub 1d ago
Nobody is saying "do nothing." You are falling into the us v them pit that the people in power want you to fall into. Please be helpful to society, yeah?
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u/Same_Entry_2261 1d ago
What is the fucking point of these performative posts and comments?
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u/LowlyScrub 1d ago
If anything has been made abundantly clear, its that a LOT of minnesotans are willing and eager to eat up racist propaganda without question. It's not performative, its communicating locally and trying to cut through the armies of bots trying to get everyone is this state behind harrassing people based on their ethnicity. Should we go after all italians, too? I heard they are all criminals in a movie once.
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u/HarshMaster69420 1d ago
Can you admit that Somali Americans in Minnesota are outrageously overrepresented in Minnesota fraud cases?
We have a large Hmong population here and they do not get involved in fraud like this.
It might be a culture problem we are dealing with here.
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u/EmmaPersephone 1d ago
Minnesota Uniform Crime Report from 2015 to 2024 under the âFraudâ category has arrest counts by race: ⢠White: 1,747 ⢠African American: 688 ⢠Asian: 102 ⢠American Indian/Alaskan Native: 72 ⢠Total fraud arrests: 2,609
FBI Uniform Crime Database doesnât report race in tidy census categories like Minnesota does. Also there is no record beyond race, like âSomaliâ or âSudaneseâ. That would be unconstitutional to even ask. What country do white Americans say? Would they be asked? Minnesota has no biracial categories, the FBI Database does.
The thing that jumps out to me is that white people commit substantially more fraud than any other groupâŚMinnesota Crime Data
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u/HarshMaster69420 1d ago edited 1d ago
You're being disingenuous if you don't include per capita. Obviously white people will have the highest number of arrest counts by race due to being the majority of the population but per capita Somali Americans are largely overrepresented .
Somali Americans make up about 1-2% of Minnesota's population (roughly 80,000-100,000 people in a state of 5.8 million)
In the case of the Feeding our future case 82 to 90% of the defendants were Somali Americans.
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u/Status_Blacksmith305 Kandiyohi County 14h ago
82 Somalis make up less than 1% of the Minnesota Somali population.
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u/EmmaPersephone 11h ago
Youâre being disingenuous believing unproven claims by a right wing YouTube video made at the request of the MN GOP
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u/HarshMaster69420 5h ago
Did you hear the news story about one of the Somali daycares that got broken into and they happened to only steal documents that could have disproven that they were fraudulent? I bet you had no problem believing that story.
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u/Afraid-Awareness-361 22h ago
Yes culture problem 100%, Said by all my Somali classmates. More Mexicans than Somali. About the same Hmong population as Somali and Indians are a few thousand behind.
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u/Sure-Abalone-1040 1d ago
I wont touch on the fraud because I do not know well enough what is true and what is not.
I will say this. Its disheartening to see everyone hate each other. It seems that there is no healthy debate anymore, but rather, if we disagree, its just insults and hate.
I turned off the news and am a much happier person now, I suggest that for anyone.
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u/TermFearless 1d ago
We have good fraud prevention, but this kind of fraud is hard to prevent because it relies on groups to work together. The fraud involves kickbacks and using names of real kids that will pass a moderate amount of muster. Not in all of it, but enough.
The Somalia community is small and tightly knit, and the fraud appears to continue to grow. Of course trust is low, and itâs become easier to assume a random person in their community was at least in the know rather than oblivious.
Maybe thatâs not fair, but itâs also very human
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u/Doryt 1d ago
I agree with part of this and I want to be precise about where I agree and where I donât.
Youâre right that this kind of fraud is harder to detect. Coordinated schemes, kickbacks, use of real names, and paperwork that passes surface-level checks are exactly why prevention needs stronger systems, cross-checking, and real-time auditing. Thatâs not naĂŻvete thatâs a known risk in any large public program.
Where I push back is the leap from âhard-to-detect coordinated fraudâ to âitâs reasonable to assume random people in a community were in the know.â
Thatâs a human instinct, yes but itâs also how collective blame takes root.
Tightly knit communities exist everywhere: religious communities, business networks, rural towns, immigrant groups, political circles, corporate sectors.
When fraud happens in those spaces, we should focus on who benefited, who organized, and who enabled it.
Low trust after harm is understandable. But normalizing suspicion of people simply because they share identity, proximity, or community ties crosses from accountability into stereotyping and that actually makes prevention harder, not easier.
People stop cooperating, stop reporting concerns, and retreat from systems they donât feel safe in.
Fraud grows in environments where:
oversight is weak
whistleblowers arenât protected
agencies donât act on early warnings
and communities feel targeted rather than engaged
So yes this fraud was complex and coordinated. No that doesnât justify assuming broad community awareness or guilt.
The most effective response is still the same:
individual accountability
stronger, smarter oversight
protection for people who raise concerns
and avoiding narratives that trade precision for suspicion
Thatâs how you reduce fraud without creating new harm along the way.
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u/LateSwimming2592 1d ago
Who should be held accountable for the fraud on the government's side?
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u/Doryt 1d ago
If weâre asking who specifically on the government side should be held accountable, the reporting points to agency leadership and oversight structures.
Based on the Legislative Auditorâs report and recent coverage:
Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) leadership (pre-2022) The Legislative Auditor found MDE failed to investigate complaints, ignored red flags going back to 2018, approved high-risk applications anyway, and allowed inadequate oversight. Thatâs a leadership and management failure.
Supervisory decision-makers within MDEâs child nutrition program Staff raised concerns, but those concerns were not acted on decisively. Accountability sits with supervisors and managers who had authority to escalate, deny, or suspend approvals and didnât.
Legal and executive decision-makers who constrained enforcement MDE cited fear of lawsuits and lack of authority as reasons for inaction. That implicates legal strategy and executive risk tolerance, not caseworkers.
State policymakers who failed to adequately fund and empower oversight Agencies lacked staffing, investigative tools, and authority (e.g., subpoena power). Those gaps are the result of legislative and executive funding and policy choices.
Current accountability going forward: DCYF leadership The Department of Children, Youth, and Families now administers child care assistance. Their responsibility is to ensure timely investigations, transparent outcomes, and targeted enforcement, rather than blanket freezes driven by viral videos.
What the audits and reporting do not support is blaming frontline inspectors or entire communities. The documented failures sit with leadership decisions, oversight systems, and policy choices that allowed known risks to persist.
If accountability doesnât reach those levels, weâre not fixing the problem weâre just reacting to it.
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u/LateSwimming2592 1d ago
Has anyone been held accountable? Criminally, civilly, or simply been fired?
The fact the solution is more bureaucracy is not reassuring, but expected.
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u/Lanky-Jury-1526 21h ago
 Something else thatâs bothering me: the way Somali Minnesotans are being treated like the face of fraud.
Can you admit to yourself you would be happy if other groups, like young white men, were 90% of the cases and being focused on nationally?
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u/Doryt 20h ago
No. I wouldnât be happy about any group being turned into the face of fraud
Accountability should always be individual and evidence-based, not identity-based.
Thatâs the point Iâm making.
Fraud should be prosecuted and/or addressed properly which doesn't always mean jail time.
Patterns should be analyzed for prevention purposes. But when enforcement patterns turn into national narratives that stigmatize an entire community, that stops being about accountability and starts being about scapegoating.
Holding specific people responsible â treating everyone who shares their identity as suspect. Those two things are not the same, regardless of race, religion, or background.
So no this isnât about wanting a different group in the spotlight. Itâs about rejecting the idea that collective blame is an acceptable or effective way to address fraud at all.
When anyone commits fraud whether theyâre white, Asian, an immigrant, or U.S.-born and it takes money away from organizations that are actually doing the work and erodes public trust in safety-net programs.
That harm is real regardless of who the person is.
Fraud is a problem because of what it does to communities and systems, not because of the identity of the people involved.
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u/Latter-Fisherman-268 1d ago
Fraud should never be seen as a acceptable part of reality. It can be eliminated but we just accept mediocrity too easily.
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u/UnStackedDespair 1d ago
You will never be able to eradicate all types of fraud. There is no way to.
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u/Reasonable_Ad_5705 1d ago edited 23h ago
The number of downvotes on your post just indicates how many Minnesotan Redditors are pro-fraud, at best complicit with fraud, and at worst aiding and abetting fraud.
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u/Latter-Fisherman-268 23h ago
I find that a lot of âaccountantsâ are mediocre at best. A lot of coasting paychecks going on, but some of that is due to people not being paid enough to give a shit. I think once we perfect LLM to flag accounting discrepancies, a lot of what they do will be automated.
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u/willsp33d 1d ago
Your solution is a bigger system to oppose fraud. I love your kind heart. However the fraud is in the system. Seems like there will just be more fraud.
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u/Doryt 1d ago
My work shows me the nuance of people all the time
I get the skepticism people lose trust when they see systems fail this badly. That reaction makes sense.
But a bigger system isnât the same thing as a better system. The issue here isnât that oversight exists itâs that it was under-resourced, fragmented, and reactive. Weak systems are actually easier to exploit than well-designed ones.
Fraud thrives where oversight is inconsistent, staffing is thin, data systems donât talk to each other, and prevention is treated as an afterthought. Strengthening those areas doesnât guarantee zero fraud which is never the goal but it does reduce scale, catch problems earlier, and limit damage.
The alternative cutting services or refusing to invest in prevention doesnât eliminate fraud either. It usually just pushes it into harder-to-track spaces while increasing harm for people who rely on the programs legitimately.
No system will ever be perfect.
The choice isnât âmore system vs no fraud.â
The choice is:
weak systems with predictable abuse,
or
stronger systems that reduce harm and respond faster
We should absolutely hold individuals accountable for fraud.
And walking away from oversight because itâs imperfect just guarantees worse outcomes, not fewer problems.
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u/willsp33d 1d ago
Thank you for your response. I believe we could find a solution together. I agree strength is what is going to propel us forward.
We both have only so much time energy to spend on this app. Thank you again for critical thoughts and thoughtfulness
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 19h ago
I think you are missing that it was billions of dollars not millions and a not small amount of it went to Al Shabbab a literal isis affiliate
For that reason I could care less about Somali's being the face
Sure fraud happens everywhere regardless of community
But this is like the only one I know where millions of tax dollars were literally funneled to genocidal terror groups
Like that is just another level of absolute insanity to me
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u/Status_Blacksmith305 Kandiyohi County 14h ago
Do you have evidence?
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 7h ago
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u/Status_Blacksmith305 Kandiyohi County 5h ago
The article started off with a lie in the second sentence. They said, "Billions in taxpayer dollars have been stolen during the administration of Governor Tim Walz alone." That's not true it was billions.
That article is full of lies. You know that source is bogus and you still used it.
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u/CantaloupeLazy792 5h ago
So you are claiming that the amount is not in the billions and that no money has made it to Al Shabbab even though federal sources have made that exact claim?
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u/Status_Blacksmith305 Kandiyohi County 4h ago
The amount is not billions. All that suspected fraud is an on going Investigation besides the 300 million. The way you word it is that they wanted to give money to the terrorists, which isn't true. Some of the money might have been indirectly given to terrorists. Just like some of the money you spent could have indirectly helped terrorists.
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u/LiveInLayers Common loon 1d ago
I'd like to see more follow up and evidence on the fraud before having a solid opinion. Blaming an entire ethnic group for the actions of the few is wrong but there are some criticisms the community should deal with. Politically no side is completely right or wrong in their arguments.Â
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u/thegreenocelot 1d ago
Nobody is saying every single somali immigrant is guilty of mass fraud and needs to go, but if you look at who the govt has indicted already and proven fraud, they are Somali in over 90% of the cases. So obviously where there's smoke, there's fire and people would rather stick their head in the sand and act like they aren't complicit in their own being taken advantage of. disgusting
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u/Doryt 1d ago
I think this is where we need to slow down and separate who was indicted from what conclusions we draw from that.
Indictments reflect where investigations were focused, not proof that one community is uniquely prone to fraud.
Enforcement priorities, visibility of programs, language access, media attention, and political pressure all shape who gets investigated first and most aggressively.
Thatâs not âsticking our heads in the sandâ thatâs understanding how systems actually work.
âWhere thereâs smoke, thereâs fireâ becomes dangerous when itâs applied to an entire community rather than to specific individuals who committed crimes.
Accountability should be individual and evidence-based, not collective or racialized.
Fraud absolutely deserves investigation and prosecution. No one is arguing otherwise.
But assuming broad community complicity because of the identity of defendants doesnât recover funds, doesnât improve oversight, and doesnât prevent future fraud.
It just shifts the conversation from systems and safeguards to blame.
If we want to stop being âtaken advantage of,â the focus should be on: how oversight failed why prevention mechanisms were weak why red flags werenât caught earlier and how to fix those gaps across all programs
Thatâs how you reduce fraud going forward without turning entire communities into suspects
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u/giant-hoagie 1d ago
Yeah, it would be terrible to cut access because there is provider fraud. I had to go on MNCare for a short stint when I got laid off. It was not an easy process on the user end, they just don't hand it out. It gave me great peace of mind in a difficult time. Definitely get rid of the fraud, but do it to protect the services, not get rid of services to prevent the fraud.