Image Credit: Chip Somodevilla / Staff / Getty Images 
At least $9 billion has been defrauded from Medicaid services in Minnesota since 2018.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, First Assistant Attorney Joe Thompson revealed the shocking figure.
Thompson said 14 Medicaid services in the state are now being audited as “high risk” for fraud. Those programs cost around $18 billion since 2018.
He said a “significant amount” of that total was fraud, but didn’t specify an exact total.
“I don’t make these generalizations in a hasty way,” he later added.
“When I say significant amount, I’m talking on the order of half or more. But we’ll see. When I look at the claims data and the providers, I see more red flags than I see legitimate providers.”
“The magnitude of fraud in Minnesota cannot be overstated. It’s staggering amounts of money that have been lost.”
President Trump has called Minnesota a “hub of fraudulent money laundering activity” under its Democrat governor, Tim Walz.
Close to 80 people have now been charged in connection with the group Feeding our Future, an organization that was supposed to serve food to poor children. Instead, it’s alleged, the money for food was pocketed by the organization’s founders.
One defendant charged in the case, Abdirashid Bixi Dool, is alleged to have “falsely claimed to be serving over 40,000 meals to children every week.”
According to the DOJ, “In support of his false claims, Dool submitted fraudulent invoices, purporting to detail the food purchased by Bilaal and MRC to feed hungry children. In reality, Dool purchased very little food. Dool also submitted phony rosters purporting to list the names of the hungry children who he fed at his meal sites. These rosters were also fake.”
Back in May, Infowars reported on a massive fraud scandal involving autism centers in Minnesota.
Autism centers in the state increased 700% between 2018 and 2023, from 41 to 328 providers, and from receiving $6 million in state money to $192 million.
The supposed prevalence of autism in Minnesota is 1 in 16.
In 2009, a Minnesota Department of Health study found that the proportion of 3-to-4-year-old Somali children receiving autism services was seven times higher than the rate for non-Somali children.
Two providers, Smart Therapy in Minneapolis and Star Autism in St Cloud, became the focus of an FBI investigation last year after former employees came forward with evidence of the scale of the fraud taking place. According to an FBI warrant, these clinics were run by “18- or 19-year-old relatives of the owners who had no formal education beyond high school or certification related to the treatment of autism.” Many of the children being “treated” by the clinics showed no signs of autism at all. One witness cited by the FBI said they believed parents were being paid to bring perfectly normal children to the fake clinics as part of the fraud scheme. They also billed the state even when “care providers” were out of the country, including in Somalia.
Both of these providers received millions of dollars a year from the government. During a three-year period, Smart Therapy billed Medicaid $850,000 for services for a single client, and received $438,000 in payment for those services.
