Category: Tim Walz
‘Fraud Tourism Industry’: Criminals Flocked to Minnesota To Cash In On ‘Easy Money’ Fraud Schemes, Federal Prosecutor Says While Announcing New Charges
Minnesota has “developed a fraud tourism industry” that entices scammers to travel to the North Star State to exploit “easy money” taxpayer-funded programs, Joe Thompson, the federal prosecutor behind the Somali fraud convictions, said Thursday. He unveiled charges against six new defendants, including two who were based in Philadelphia.
The post ‘Fraud Tourism Industry’: Criminals Flocked to Minnesota To Cash In On ‘Easy Money’ Fraud Schemes, Federal Prosecutor Says While Announcing New Charges appeared first on .
‘A Magnet for Fraud’: Criminals Flocked to Minnesota to Cash In On ‘Easy Money’ Fraud Schemes, Federal Prosecutor Says While Announcing New Charges
Minnesota has “developed a fraud tourism industry” that entices scammers to travel to the North Star State to exploit “easy money” taxpayer-funded programs, Joe Thompson, the federal prosecutor behind the Somali fraud convictions, said Thursday. He unveiled charges against six new defendants, including two who were based in Philadelphia.
The post ‘A Magnet for Fraud’: Criminals Flocked to Minnesota to Cash In On ‘Easy Money’ Fraud Schemes, Federal Prosecutor Says While Announcing New Charges appeared first on .
‘Beachhead of criminality’: Trump admin urges Walz to resign in light of ‘ghost students’ fraud scheme
Minnesota appears to be a magnet for fraudsters, particularly from Somalia.
While the problem has hardly been a secret — scores of bad actors have been charged and/or convicted in connection with various fraud schemes in the state — the Trump administration has recently taken a special interest, exploring just how bad the graft has gotten on Democratic-Farmer-Labor Gov. Tim Walz’s watch.
Much of the focus has so far been on the alleged fraud committed by members of the Somali community in relation to coronavirus pandemic relief funding. However, Education Secretary Linda McMahon hammered Walz in a letter on Monday over student aid fraud in the Gopher State, calling on him to resign.
‘Minnesota’s political elite has turned a blind eye and even helped facilitate the laundering of money.’
“At the beginning of this year, the U.S. Department of Education became aware that fraudulent college applicants, especially concentrated in Minnesota, were gaming the federal postsecondary education system to collect money that was intended for young Americans to help them afford college,” wrote McMahon.
The education secretary referred to these fraudsters as “ghost students” because “they were not ID-verified and often did not live in the United States, or they simply did not exist.”
According to McMahon, 1,834 so-called ghost students were found to have received $12.5 million in taxpayer-funded grants and loans in Walz’s state.
In June, the Education Department flagged Riverland Community College and Century College in White Bear Lake as two of the institutions in Minnesota that were impacted by the fraud scheme.
RELATED: Tim Walz tries gaslighting Americans again — this time about Trump’s ‘garbage’ remark
Photo by Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images
The Rochester Post Bulletin reported in April that Riverland had apparently averaged more than 100 potentially fraudulent applications per year for the previous two financial aid periods.
A history instructor at Century College reportedly told state lawmakers earlier this year that he discovered in 2023 that 15% of his students were “basically an organized crime ring.”
Minnesota State College Southeast was similarly impacted, having discovered that the spike in its 2025 spring enrollment numbers was driven by 84 ghost students. While some of the apparent fraudsters at these and other institutions were locals, most were reportedly from other countries.
Ghost students will reportedly engage remotely and do the bare minimum of classwork until financial aid funds are doled out around 10 days into the semester. Once their payday arrives, they usually vanish.
“They collected checks from the federal government, shared a small portion of the money with the college, and pocketed the rest — without attending the college at all,” said McMahon. “Our new fraud prevention system has now blocked more than $1 billion in attempted financial aid theft by fraudsters, including coordinated international fraud rings and AI bots pretending to be students.”
The education secretary stressed that Walz’s “careless lack of oversight and abuse of the welfare system has attracted fraudsters from around the world, especially from Somalia, to establish a beachhead of criminality in our country.”
McMahon further suggested that Walz has done “nothing as governor to stop this criminal behavior” such that scammers have “gotten rich off federal housing, education, food stamp, and small business programs — even defrauding assistance for elder care and autistic children.”
After suggesting that “Minnesota’s political elite has turned a blind eye and even helped facilitate the laundering of money that was meant to help America’s least fortunate,” McMahon accused Walz of benefiting from the sordid state of play and implored him to resign.
Republican Majority Whip Tom Emmer (Minn.) said that McMahon’s assessment of Walz’s “catastrophic failures” was “spot on,” adding that “it’s time for Walz to take accountability and make way for real leadership to clean up this mess.”
Walz plans to seek a third term next year.
Former health care executive and Army veteran Kendall Qualls won the non-binding Minnesota GOP gubernatorial straw poll on Saturday, winning three more votes from delegates than Minnesota House Speaker Lisa Demuth.
While a September poll found that Walz had a significant edge over Qualls, it appears Minnesotans are fast losing faith in their governor and his ability to curb fraud in the state.
A recent KSTP-TV/SurveyUSA poll of 578 registered voters found that 69% believe Walz needs to do more to stop fraud in Minnesota. According to the poll, Walz’s disapproval rating is 48%.
“It’s pretty obvious,” Walz said during a press conference on Friday. “Fraud happened. We need to take accountability — ultimately me.”
“I take responsibility for everything,” added the governor.
Blaze News has reached out to the governor’s office for comment.
McMahon’s letter comes just weeks after Small Business Administration Sec. Kelly Loeffler announced an investigation “into the network of Somali organizations and executives implicated” in the $1 billion Minnesota COVID fraud scandal, particularly those who received SBA PPP loans.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Ilhan Omar accuses ICE of ‘racially profiling’ her son during traffic stop
Democrat Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota was quick to play the race card after her son was pulled over by ICE in a traffic stop Sunday.
Omar’s son was pulled over by ICE after making a stop at Target, and he was asked to produce his identification, according to the congresswoman’s account. Despite Omar’s accusations of racial profiling, her son was let go by ICE after producing his passport.
‘There’s nothing worse than when a person comes in and does nothing but b***h.’
“They are racially profiling,” Omar said of the ICE raids in Minnesota. “They are looking for young men who look Somali that they think are undocumented.”
“Yesterday, after he made a stop at Target, he did get pulled over by ICE agents,” Omar added. “Once he was able to produce his passport ID, they did let him go.”
RELATED: ‘The voices in her head are not real’: Senator Kennedy issues a hilarious rebuke of Jasmine Crockett
Christian Monterrosa/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Omar’s political allies quickly came to bat for her and her son, doubling down on the narrative that he was pulled over for racial reasons. Notably, neither law enforcement nor the congresswoman have clarified why her son was pulled over in the first place.
“Congresswoman Omar’s son was pulled over by ICE while he was following the law, on his way home from Target,” failed Democrat vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said in a post on X. “This isn’t a targeted operation to find violent criminals, it’s racial profiling.”
Despite the left decrying alleged racial motivations, President Donald Trump has maintained his criticisms of Omar and Somali migrants in Minnesota, citing their lack of assimilation and the disproportionally high rates of fraud.
“There’s nothing worse than a person that comes in and does nothing but b***h,” Trump told Blaze News in the Oval Office Friday, “and comes from a place where she shouldn’t be telling us what to do. She shouldn’t be telling us. And everybody agrees with me.”
“What’s happening in Minnesota with Somalia, where billions of dollars are being stolen like candy from a baby, we’re not going to let that go on.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
A Tim Walz Christmas
“A Tim Walz Christmas,” editorial cartoon by Tom Stiglich for The American Spectator on Dec. 10, 2025.
Gavin Newsom laughs after Tim Walz claims he’s too masculine: ‘I’m not bulls**tting’
Democratic Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota boldly argues that the real reason his political opponents focus so much on him is not because of bad policy, but because of his overwhelming masculinity.
The failed vice presidential candidate joined fellow Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California to discuss the “toxicity” in masculinity. In a clip of a March episode of “This Is Gavin Newsom” that circulated on social media this week, the California Democrat argued that this “toxicity” needs to be disentangled from masculinity, while Walz proudly exclaimed that his masculinity was simply too much for his political rivals to handle.
‘I’m serious!’
“This notion of toxicity in masculinity needs to be separated,” Newsom said. “And I think it’s been conflated. And I think we’re going to have to work on that a little bit.”
Newsom began to describe the Democratic Party’s regression among demographics like young men. But before Newsom could prescribe an antidote to the Democrats’ loss with male voters, Walz chimed in to suggest that those who criticize him and some of his fellow male Democrats feel threatened by their masculinity.
Photo by KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI/AFP via Getty Images
“I think some of us scare them,” Walz replied. “I think I scare them a little bit. That’s why they spend so much time on me.”
Newsom erupted in laughter at the notion that Walz’s masculinity was alienating young men from the Democratic Party.
“No, I’m serious!” Walz said. “Because I can fix a truck, they know I’m not bulls**tting on this.”
RELATED: Tim Walz tries gaslighting Americans again — this time about Trump’s ‘garbage’ remark
Photo by ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images
“I’m not putting this in people’s grill,” Walz said. “My identity is not hunting. My identity is not football coaching. My identity is not, you know, a beard and a truck.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Tim Walz tries gaslighting Americans again — this time about Trump’s ‘garbage’ remark
Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz appears keen to clutch pearls and hold President Donald Trump to a different standard than Walz did the previous president — especially after Trump called Walz “seriously retarded.”
Quick background
During a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Trump leaned into his criticism of Somalia, the rampant fraud in Minnesota’s Somali community, and Somalia’s top spokeswoman in Congress, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.).
‘This is on top of all the other vile comments.’
“Somalia, which is barely a country, you know, they have no, anything. They just run around killing each other. There’s no structure,” said the president.
Somalia is a Sunni Muslim nation on the easternmost part of Africa with a population of just over 19 million, a high rate of female genital mutilation, a GDP of $12.94 billion, and an adult literacy rate of 54%.
The country is a haven for crime and terrorism, ranking 34th out of 193 countries for criminality on the Global Organized Crime Index. With 10 being the most severe, Somalia scores 8.5 for human trafficking; 8 for human smuggling; 9.5 for extortion and protection racketeering; 9 for arms trafficking; 7 for financial crimes; and 7 for trade in counterfeit goods.
Trump appears to suspect that America imported some of Somalia’s chronic problems when accepting its refugees.
Following a report detailing instances of alleged and confirmed fraud perpetrated by numerous members of the Somali community in Minnesota, Trump announced on Nov. 21 that he was terminating the Temporary Protected Status designation for Somalia.
RELATED: DHS to increase operations in Twin Cities region as Somali fraud becomes unignorable
Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
“Somalians ripped off that state for billions of dollars. Billions every year. Billions of dollars, and they contribute nothing. The welfare is like 88%. They contribute nothing,” continued Trump. “I don’t want them in our country; I’ll be honest with you. Some might say, ‘Oh, that’s not politically correct.’ I don’t care. I don’t want them in our country. Their country is no good for a reason. Their country stinks, and we don’t want them in our country. I can say that about other countries too.”
Trump added, “We’re at a tipping point. I don’t know if people mind me saying that, but I’m saying it. We could go one way or the other, and we’re going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country.”
“Ilhan Omar is garbage. She’s garbage. Her friends are garbage. These aren’t people that work,” Trump said, leaving no room for ambiguity.
“These are people who do nothing but complain.”
Walz whines, gaslights
Walz made a big show on Thursday of denouncing Trump’s remarks and calling on others to do likewise.
“Donald Trump’s calling our Somali neighbors ‘garbage’ and the state of Minnesota a ‘hellhole’ is, I’m assuming, is unprecedented for a United States president,” said Walz, who has bent the truth to his benefit on numerous occasions.
The use of the term “garbage” by an American president in reference to a group of people is not unprecedented. In fact, Walz downplayed former President Joe Biden’s use of the term to describe nearly half the country just last year.
When stumping for then-presidential candidate Kamala Harris in October 2024, Biden fixated on a joke made by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe about Puerto Rico during a humorous speech at a Trump rally in New York City — a rally that Walz had likened to a Nazi rally. Rather than brush off the joke, Biden apparently tried to outdo Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables” smear.
“A speaker at his rally called Puerto Rico a ‘floating island of garbage.’ Well, let me tell you something,” said Biden. “In my home state of Delaware, they’re good, decent, honorable people. The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters.”
After Biden suggested that the over 77.3 million who would ultimately vote for Trump were “garbage,” Walz downplayed the remark when asked in a “CBS Mornings” interview whether that comment and others like it undercut the Democratic campaign’s “closing message of unity.”
“No, certainly not,” said Walz. “I think that the frustration we’ve seen since January 6, the frustration with Donald Trump’s rhetoric of division, it does fire passions.”
After suggesting on Thursday that Trump’s “garbage” remark was a first, Walz, a champion of racist DEI initiatives, said that “demonizing an entire group of people by their race and their ethnicity — a very group of people who contribute to the vitality, economic [sic], culture of this state is something I was hoping we’d never have to see. This is on top of all the other vile comments.”
The Democratic governor said that any officials in Minnesota who would not condemn Trump’s “vile attack” are “complicit in it.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Yes, the New York Times Really Ran a Story About Social Services Fraud by Immigrants
WASHINGTON — Somali immigrants living in Minnesota effectively stole more than $1 billion in taxpayer money over the last five…
