A new investigation by Christopher Rufo and Ryan Thorpe exposes what every taxpayer should be furious about: evidence that billions in Minnesota welfare and pandemic-relief dollars were stolen and, through informal remittance networks, funneled back to Somalia where some of those funds have ended up benefiting Al-Shabaab. This is not a theoretical threat — investigators and retired Joint Terrorism Task Force members told the reporters they traced money flows from sham programs in Minnesota to hawala operators who pass cash to networks in Somalia.
The fraud is massive and well-documented: the Feeding Our Future scandal alone involved hundreds of millions in fraudulent claims, and federal prosecutors have won convictions and handed down serious sentences to ringleaders who turned pandemic relief meant for kids into personal fortunes. The Department of Justice and allied agencies have prosecuted scores of defendants in these schemes, and courts recently imposed long prison terms on key figures in what prosecutors called one of the largest pandemic-era fraud operations in the nation.
How did this happen? Reporters found that many of the stolen dollars were laundered through hawala networks — informal money-trading systems used by diaspora communities — and then remitted to Somalia, where federal sources say Al-Shabaab takes a cut from the economic activity. Retired investigators told Rufo and Thorpe they witnessed transfers of millions and traced cash movements on commercial flights and through hawalas, a pipeline that should have been detected and shut down long before it helped line the pockets of terrorists.
This scandal is also a political indictment. Minnesota’s sprawling welfare apparatus, overseen by a Democratic administration that repeatedly prioritized expansion over accountability, created the conditions for fraud to flourish. Officials only shuttered the Housing Stabilization Services program after evidence of fraud surfaced and federal indictments grew to dozens; taxpayers deserve to know why safeguards were so weak while fraud exploded under the governor’s watch.
Law enforcement must follow the money and the politicians must stop hiding behind “sensitivity” and race-based excuses when criminality emerges in any community. The U.S. Attorney’s Office and federal partners have been prosecuting the Feeding Our Future and related cases, but these prosecutions must be paired with policy fixes: stricter auditing, cutting off illicit hawala flows when they’re tied to fraud, and criminal penalties for intermediaries who knowingly move stolen taxpayer dollars.
Make no mistake: when stolen American aid finds its way into the hands of an al-Qaeda-linked terror group, this transcends local corruption and becomes a national-security failure. Sources in the investigation bluntly warned that, as money keeps moving back to Somalia, Americans are effectively underwriting an enemy that has murdered U.S. soldiers and slaughtered civilians — something no patriotic American should tolerate.
Voters should take this into the ballot box. With statewide and federal officials either asleep or complicit in weak oversight, Minnesotans and concerned citizens nationwide must demand accountability in 2026 and beyond: prosecute corruption ruthlessly, reform welfare programs so they serve the needy rather than fraudsters, and secure the borders and financial pipelines that let stolen taxpayer dollars fund terrorism abroad. Our children, our taxpayers, and our national security deserve nothing less.
