Donald Trump made fraud allegations the major justification for his brutal recent crackdown in Minnesota, but according to a Friday report from HuffPost, he was told about those allegations years ago and did nothing.
Minnesota's Twin Cities area is still in the midst of a historically massive immigration enforcement operation, which been likened to a terror campaign from the federal government and resulted in the deaths of two U.S. citizens at the hands of federal agents. Trump has claimed from the beginning that the operation was primarily in response to welfare fraud in the state, which had been investigated and prosecuted years ago, but reemerged in the right-wing media space after a YouTube creator highlighted it again.
However, according to HuffPost's report, the first Trump administration was first informed about potential fraud by the Minnesota-based food nonprofit at the heart of the allegations, Feeding Our Future, receiving reports that it might be engaged in fraud. In response, the administration declined to take any action.
"That year, the Minnesota Department of Education asked the U.S. Department of Agriculture for support as it considered taking action against the nonprofit, which had contracts to provide meals for children and adults with disabilities," HuffPost's report detailed. "Minnesota told the USDA about startling growth in Feeding Our Future’s reimbursements, which increased 252 percent from 2019. While pandemic-driven changes could explain some of the increase, Minnesota’s overall reimbursements for the federal programs in question had only gone up 14 percent."
An audit report released by the Minnesota state legislature about the Feeding Our Future investigation said officials with the state;'s Education Department "complained that the USDA was unresponsive when they asked about how to deal with problems presented by the nonprofit."
“For example, one MDE official told us that in communications between MDE and USDA about initiating administrative action against Feeding Our Future, USDA pushed responsibility back to MDE, telling the department that it should make decisions consistent with federal regulations,” the audit explained.
One USDA official from this time, speaking to HuffPost anonymously, said that they had urged higher-ups to take action, but was rebuffed.
“I was very frustrated and disappointed that we didn’t act faster,” the individual said. “We were waiting for it to hit the papers. When it did, nobody was surprised."
They added: "This whole thing started during the first Trump administration, and what’s frustrating to me is, reading these news stories, there’s no acknowledgement of that."
As the story has reemerged, Trump has used the past scandal to spread lies about his political opponents, claiming the Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had opted not to run for reelection because he was "caught" stealing, and did so with Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar and "others of his Somali friends," despite the fact that the is no evidence either lawmaker was involved in the fraud.
