Der Gouverneur von Minnesota, Tim Walz, schlägt zurück, als die Trump-Regierung die Kinderbetreuungsgelder des Staates aufgrund von Betrugsvorwürfen einfriert
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/tim-walz-trump-fraud-somali-b2892474.html
21 Kommentare
>*The Minnesota governor and 2024 Trump campaign rival accused the president of wrongfully ‘demonizing’ the entire Somali community in Minnesota in the wake of fraud investigations*
>Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has sharply criticized the Trump administration Tuesday over its decision to pause federal child care funds to the state after an influencer’s video went viral alleging widespread fraud there in government programs.
>“This is Trump’s long game,” Walz, who was on the Democratic ticket against Trump in 2024, wrote on X. “We’ve spent years cracking down on fraudsters. It’s a serious issue – but this has been his plan all along. He’s politicizing the issue to defund programs that help Minnesotans.”
>The comments came as the Department of Health and Human Services announced that it was freezing child care payments to the state.
…
In the video, which state Republican leadership said they assisted in creating, Shirley travels to what he says are empty centers where he claims fraud is taking place, though it’s unclear when in the week Shirley was visiting the facilities, and some observers in the state say the video is not well-evidenced enough to be considered accurate factual reporting.
>State officials say all the centers in the video have been visited in the past six months and fraud was not discovered.
>The manager of one of the centers in the video told the *Minnesota StarTribune* that while children are not visible from the outside, they were in fact present when Shirley visited, but that doors to the center are locked for safety.
>Despite these caveats, Republicans have quickly latched onto the claims in the video, folding them into the president and the MAGA movement’s regular demonization of Somali people and immigrant communities at large.
…
In an op-ed earlier this month, Walz said the state had implemented “systematic changes” in recent years, including replacing state leaders, sending individuals to jail, hiring a former state police chief and FBI agent to oversee program integrity, and bringing in an outside firm to audit payments.
>“What is not helpful is the president of the United States demonizing an entire community or pardoning someone single-handedly responsible for $1.6 billion in fraud,” Walz wrote in the StarTribune, a reference to Trump’s recent commutation of private equity executive David Gentile’s prison sentence.
>“If there were a silver bullet to solve this issue, we wouldn’t be seeing similar issues in these federal Medicaid programs in red and blue states across the country — including multi-million-dollar fraud schemes in Ohio, Arizona, Nebraska, Texas and Pennsylvania,” he added.
Republicans in Minnesota were against increasing spending for fraud detection:
March 2025 – [Walz proposes $39 million anti-fraud plan that includes new centralized investigations unit](https://www.house.mn.gov/sessiondaily/Story/18635)
>New hires, better use of AI and increased data sharing are ways Gov. Tim Walz has suggested the state use to go after people looking to commit fraud.
…
Rep. Jon Koznick (R-Lakeville) and Rep. Jim Joy (R-Hawley) expressed concern about increasing the cost of government with darker financial times looming.
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What we’re being told is we can’t stop fraud without more money when we’re looking at a nearly $6 billion deficit, Joy said. “I would encourage us to try to find other avenues.”
CBS tried to corroborate Nick Shirley’s investigation and found inconsistencies:
https://x.com/cbsnews/status/2006040360741458116
>A recent video by conservative YouTuber Nick Shirley alleged nearly a dozen day care centers in Minnesota that are receiving public funds are not actually providing any service. After the video went viral, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem announced a „massive investigation on childcare and other rampant fraud“ in the state.
>CBS News conducted its own analysis of nearly a dozen day care centers mentioned by Shirley: all but two have active licenses, according to state records, and all active locations were visited by state regulators within the last six months. CBS News‘ review also found dozens of citations related to safety, cleanliness, equipment, and staff training, among other violations, but there was no recorded evidence of fraud.
More inconsistencies reported by CBS over Nick Shirley’s video:
[Director of Minnesota day care featured in YouTube video on fraud responds](https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minnesota-day-care-fraud-director-responds/)
>On Tuesday afternoon, WCCO found more than a dozen children at the day care working with several adult staff members. Director Ahmed Hasan said that they were working on basic language and math skills.
>“Every day is like this,“ Hasan said.
>On the day Shirley came to the center, the time stamps on the day care’s security tapes show that he arrived around noon. WCCO reviewed security footage showing families evidently arriving to drop off their children earlier that morning and later in the afternoon.
>When Shirley knocked on the door, he seemed to fabricate a reason for being there, asking to check a child into the day care. A staff member responds verbally but doesn’t let him in; Hasan said that they can’t allow strangers into an active day care. In addition, he said that Shirley had a team of up to eight people with him. Some were masked, according to Hasan, which set off alarm bells for his staff members, given recent ICE activity.
Trump’s administration just wants to hurt people.
Trump really seems to hate little kids, huh? Unless he’s fucking them, of course. Then they’re fine.
Fuck Trump.
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Its the new birth certificate crazy theory stuff.
Frauds only bad when its a democratic ran state. So remember kids, if youre going to commit white color crime, do it in a red state.
Dude, seriously? Smh, just feels like another power move to me. Child care is essential, not some political pawn for petty games. Kids shouldn’t suffer bcoz of adult’s greed, plain and simple. Idc who’s right or wrong here, but putting politics above people is the real fraud. This ain’t a hot take, it’s common sense, y’all. Morals b4 politics, always.
Seen this popping up on some of the right influencers‘ pages as the next big scandal, but ignore anything happening from red states. They are all trying to tie Walz to it, as they are scared of him. They know if he is on top of the 2028 ticket, they are cooked.
MAGAts love a good outrage and over reaction story. Specially when it can be used to hurt democrats, women, children, poor people…
I just can’t believe Trump has the brain power to pull that off. Probably that piece of shit Miller.
trump: freezes 185m for kids cuz some youtuber said “somali fraud”
walz: we been auditing since 2019 but ok, guess toddlers gotta submit selfies now to prove they exist
Lmao. Fuckin idiots
“Someone Italian American kid prank called the fire department, so I’m shutting the whole fire department down and deporting everyone from Italy!”
Donald Trump, is he petty in his stupidity or is he stupid in his pettiness? Probably both.
so easy for the GOP to generate bullshit news
Just a friendly reminder that the sitting president of U.S. is currently involved in a cover-up regarding sex trafficking and the rape of minors.
Why do childcare facilities need government money anyway? Its a business it should be self funded
I read up on the case, it was solved back in 2022 by the FBI and Biden Administration, people were prosecuted, charged and convicted (it was the abuse of C19 loans along with the state’s child support loan). It’s currently back in the news because of a right wing content creator brought it up 26 December and the current administration and conservatives are chewing up on it because the case involved Somalis.
It’s racism and xenophobia ultimately at the core of this sudden revival.
This BS is the new Pizzagate. Or at least an attempt at it.
Oh yes the guy that let all of this fraud happen either out of sheer stupidity or out of corruption.
If there is fraud then by all means it should be investigated individually, but blanket freezing the entire state will just hurt the wrong people. The Trump administrations actions of course are just publicity stunts for news headlines to Troll Walz without any consideration who might be affected by the mandate.
I’m hearing AM radio acting like Walz himself is guilty of that fraud scheme. What relation does he really have with it besides being governor of the state it happened in?
“In the video, which state Republican leadership said they assisted in creating, Shirley travels to what he says are empty centers where he claims fraud is taking place, “ – seems kind of important that Republicans state officials new the locations to go to but we’re not actively preventing the fraud and instead helping someone make a video.