Trump officials tout Minnesota social services fraud charges, convictions

Top Trump administration officials on Friday highlighted their efforts to pursue public program fraud in Minnesota at a news conference in St. Cloud days before the midterm elections.

The FBI in Minneapolis executed 17 search warrants Thursday and charged four people with allegedly defrauding government programs, FBI Director Kash Patel told reporters.

“They thought they could get away with their crimes,” he said. “They were not successful because of this team and the president and vice president’s anti-fraud task force.”

Those charged include:

• Faiza Osman Ahmed, 41, owner of Home Sweet Home Health Care in Bloomington, is accused of stealing $8 million from three programs designed to help the elderly and disabled receive care at home.

• Feisal Mohamed Elmi, 46, owner of Aspen Associates in Minneapolis, allegedly defrauded the state’s autism program out of $2.8 million.

• Jama Yusuf Mohamod, 68, is accused of defrauding the Medicaid Integrated Community Support Program out of $3.2 million through his company American Home Health Care of Maple Grove.

Ahmed, Elmi and Mohamod each pleaded not guilty during their first appearance in Minneapolis court Thursday.

Habiba Mohamed, co-owner of Smart Therapy in Minneapolis, is also accused of participating in a scheme to defraud the Medicaid Intensive Early Developmental and Behavioral Intervention program for children with autism out of $14 million. Mohamed is expected to plead guilty at a hearing Nov. 12 in St. Paul, according to court records.

Three other people connected to the company have already been charged, including Asha Farhan Hassan, who pleaded guilty in December to defrauding the autism program and participating in the Feeding Our Future program.

“Our nation’s war on fraud started right here in Minnesota,” said Dr. Mehmet Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. “The problems we have identified here are not unique to Minnesota, but they are particularly evident in Minnesota. »

“Crush fraud”

Oz also highlighted the case of Sharmaine Meadows of Lake Elmo, who was convicted Oct. 7 of three counts of health care fraud related to Minnesota’s Medicaid Housing Stabilization Services program that the Walz administration closed last year. Oz is committed to “eliminating fraud and corruption here and across the country.”

Since 2022, state and federal prosecutors in Minnesota have charged more than 100 people with defrauding government social service programs, with much of that work centered on the Feeding Our Future fraud scheme.

The Trump administration cited fraud to justify sending thousands of federal immigration agents to Minnesota last winter. However, no one arrested during the winter operation has been charged with fraud.

While Friday’s news conference was a formal event at the White House, Republicans have made fraud a focal point of political campaigns for state and federal offices in the run-up to Tuesday’s midterm elections. Vice President JD Vance, who chairs the White House Fraud Task Force, was scheduled to attend but canceled Thursday evening.

Why Saint-Cloud?

Officials did not say why they chose St. Cloud for the news conference, since none of the defendants mentioned are from St. Cloud. Bessent said they were invited by an assistant U.S. attorney and the task force was “very interested” in what’s happening in the area.

“The center of fraudulent activity is Minneapolis-St. Paul, but it’s statewide,” he said. “The Walz administration has been woefully negligent and turned a blind eye, so every citizen of Minnesota is a victim.”

Bessent blamed Gov. Tim Walz and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison for the fraud, suggesting without evidence that Walz was complicit.

Walz’s office responded that the state has been fighting fraud for years. “Today’s press conference provided no new information and amounts to political spectacle just days before an election,” the governor’s office said in a statement.

One reason for the news conference’s location could be St. Cloud’s large Somali American population. Most of those charged in the Feeding Our Future case are from East Africa, although the convicted ringleader, Aimee Bock, is white.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly targeted Somali immigrants, including calling them “trash” and urging Minnesotans to “fight back” against them.

Bessent declined to answer a question from KARE11 reporter Lou Raguse about the Department of Homeland Security’s August purchase of a private prison in Appleton, Minn., for $495.6 million.

A new report from Twin Cities TV revealed that the prison’s previous owner, CoreCivic, offered to sell the facility to the state of Minnesota for $75 million in 2025 before the federal government purchased it for more than six times that amount.

The difference of $420 million is more than the estimated $300 million that fraudsters linked to the Feeding Our Future program stole during the pandemic. KARE points to federal filings that show that CoreCivic’s donations to the Trump-Vance inaugural committee totaled half a million dollars and that the company’s CEO contributed to political committees associated with President Trump.