By Steve Contorno, Daniel Dale, CNN
(CNN) — A conservative influencer’s viral video alleging widespread fraud at taxpayer-funded child care centers in Minnesota’s Somali community kicked off a political firestorm years in the making.
President Donald Trump has long singled out Minnesota’s Somali population of approximately 108,000 for criticism and, even before the video emerged, pointed to fraud by members of the community as justification for his claim that Somalis “contribute nothing” to the US and shouldn’t be in the country.
Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has spent the past year dealing with the fallout from high-profile fraud schemes involving Somali residents while also pushing back against Trump’s attacks against the broader Somali community.
The viral video, which had 132 million views on X as of Wednesday afternoon, added a new layer to the controversy that isn’t easily unpacked. The video was produced by Nick Shirley, a YouTuber who has created anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim content in the past, and many of its claims could not be immediately verified.
Even so, the Trump administration halted federal child care payments to the state and launched a highly visible response as Justice Department officials insisted they had been on top of the matter all along. At the same time, Walz turned to social media to try to defend his efforts to combat fraud while also attempting to turn public attention toward Trump’s own actions.
Here’s a look at what the Trump administration and Walz have been saying in response to the controversy.
What the Trump administration has said
The Trump administration has seized on the controversy with vigor. In a Wednesday morning social media post, Trump asserted, without evidence, that “up to 90%” of “the Minnesota fraud” could be traced to people who arrived in the state “illegally” from Somalia, and he called to “send them back from where they came, Somalia.” (The vast majority of Minnesota residents of Somali descent are US citizens, tens of thousands of whom were born in the US, and many non-citizens entered legally.)
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt pledged on Fox News on Wednesday morning that the Justice Department was executing search warrants and subpoenas and that “people will be in handcuffs.”
Top administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, amplified Shirley’s video on social media. Several federal agencies publicly pledged to assist in a crackdown.
“We will bring an end to the Somali fraud network,” the US Department of Labor posted on Monday, though it did not respond to a request for details.
Perhaps most notable was the response from Trump’s top law enforcement officials, FBI Director Kash Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi, who sought to signal that their agencies had been on the case before the viral video appeared.
In a lengthy X post on Sunday, Patel wrote the FBI had “surged” anti-fraud personnel in Minnesota “even before the public conversation escalated online.”
Bondi wrote on Monday that the Justice Department “has been investigating this for months.” Both Patel and Bondi detailed a $250 million pandemic fraud scheme unearthed by the FBI in Minnesota.
In fact, the investigation into that scheme stretches back years before Trump took office.
In September 2022, the Biden Justice Department charged 47 individuals in connection with a plot by the nonprofit Feeding Our Future to steal Covid-era pandemic funds to feed needy children, using the money instead to buy luxury cars, jewelry and property. Then-Attorney General Merrick Garland called it “the largest pandemic relief fraud scheme charged to date.” By the end of President Joe Biden’s time in office, the figure had risen to about 70 people charged in connection with the scheme, CNN reported last year.
A jury convicted one of the ringleaders, Abdiaziz Shafii Farah, in June 2024 after a seven-week trial. Bondi erroneously wrote Monday on X that her office “successfully secured Farah’s conviction” in August 2025. However, that was the date of his sentencing.
Bondi also pointed to a plot by Farah and others to bribe a juror in exchange for an acquittal in the fraud case. That indictment also took place under Biden.
Beyond the Feeding Our Future scandal, Bondi noted another related scheme allegedly uncovered in Minnesota’s Somali community. In September, the Justice Department charged a 28-year-old woman with wire fraud involving federal autism funding. That investigation appears to have a longer tail as well. Minnesota media outlets reported in the summer of 2024 that the FBI was investigating Medicaid fraud related to autism funds.
What Walz has said
Walz, the Democratic candidate for vice president in 2024, was quiet about the video in the three days following its release on Friday, addressing its allegations Monday only through comments from a spokesperson. Then, in a social media post Tuesday afternoon, Walz defended his record on combating fraud — and tried to turn the public’s focus to Trump.
“We’ve spent years cracking down on fraud – referring cases to law enforcement, shutting down and auditing high-risk programs. Trump keeps letting fraudsters out of prison. To the national news just now paying attention, here’s what we’ve done to stop it,” Walz wrote on X.
Walz’s X post included images with excerpts of an op-ed he published in the Minnesota Star Tribune on December 12. The piece acknowledged that the state had been “taken advantage of by an organized group of fraudsters” and that “we have much more to do.”
But it emphasized actions he had already taken, such as hiring “investigators, auditors and law enforcement” and a “head of program integrity,” retaining “an outside firm to audit payments to high-risk programs at the Department of Human Services,” and launching “a specialized fraud-fighting law enforcement unit at the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.”
It wasn’t yet clear Wednesday whether Shirley had truly uncovered fraud at the child care centers the video suggested were not actually operational; it’s not unusual for child care centers to keep their doors locked or bar entry to unexpected visitors, and it wasn’t obvious in the video what was happening behind the closed doors he wasn’t permitted to enter. CNN and state and federal authorities were looking into the allegations.
However, it’s known that fraud has plagued multiple state agencies during Walz’s tenure — and a housing support program the Walz administration created in 2020 and shut down in 2025 after its cost ballooned. CNN reported in October 2024 that audits and interviews showed Walz had been a hands-off leader with regard to seeking accountability for episodes of fraud and mismanagement during his tenure.
As they had before the viral video, Republican state and federal lawmakers blasted Walz after the video as a failure on the fraud file, saying he had long ignored repeated warnings about dodgy child care centers and other schemes. A Republican-controlled US House committee has asked Walz to testify in the new year.
Walz posted again about Trump on Tuesday night after the federal Department of Health and Human Services announced it had frozen all child care payments to Minnesota. Walz wrote, “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.” Walz did not provide evidence of such a long-term scheme by Trump.
By its own admission, Walz’s administration was wrong at least once as it scrambled to respond to the renewed criticism prompted by the video.
In a Monday comment to CNN, a Walz spokesperson said two of the facilities featured in the video “have already been closed.” The spokesperson identified Quality Learning Center in Minneapolis as one of the supposedly shuttered facilities, echoing comments made earlier in the day by the head of the state’s Department of Children, Youth and Families. But the department told local media that Quality Learning Center had “decided to remain open” despite having notified the department on Dec. 19 that it was closing.
What social media posts have said
Shirley’s video prompted allegations that traditional media outlets had ignored the issue of fraud in Minnesota. A Saturday post on X that asserted “you literally can’t find a single mainstream article about the Minnesota fraud…Not even one…” had more than eight million views as of Wednesday morning.
Though many media outlets did not yet have coverage Saturday of a YouTube video posted the day prior, various observers correctly responded that traditional media outlets had written articles long before the video about the issue of fraud in Minnesota — including the cases involving members of the Somali community that were highlighted by Bondi and Patel. Minnesota media outlets have extensively reported on fraud stories for years, and various national outlets also covered the topic prior to the video.
The Feeding Our Future scandal received more coverage than problems with Minnesota child care centers, but Shirley wasn’t the first to report the child care story, either. In January, for example, Twin Cities television station 5 Eyewitness News aired a story in which reporter Jay Kolls noted the documented problems at Quality Learning Center and said that despite having visited several times, “only once did I see people there…but I did not see any children.”
As conservative influencers on social media criticized mainstream news outlets after the release of the video, they also pressed state and federal authorities to take action. Their demands prompted rejoinders not only from Democrats who noted Walz’s prior efforts but also a senior Trump-appointed official in the Justice Department.
A conservative commentator posted Sunday of the scandal, “NO ONE IS BEING HELD ACCOUNTABLE!!!!!” That prompted Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon to reply: “No one, besides the 99 indictments and 62 convictions so far you mean?”
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