Comer: “State leadership failed to act”

House Oversight Committee James Comer (R-KY) on Wednesday accused Minnesota officials of willfully failing to address fraud in the state’s welfare programs that prosecutors estimate may have resulted in as much as $9 billion in stolen funds.

“As our investigation has shown, it happened because state leadership failed, repeatedly, to intervene,” he said in his opening statement at a hearing with Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (D). “The fraud was real, the warning signs were obvious, and state leadership failed to act.”

The congressman said the fraud was “known, documented and repeatedly brought to the attention of state leadership.”

“In case after case, state agencies identified red flags and received warnings from auditors and employees but continued to send money out the door. Not because they lacked authority to intervene, but because they feared lawsuits, bad press and political backlash,” he said. “While Gov. Walz hesitated, taxpayers lost billions.”

Rep. Comer said the scandal involving the Minnesota nonprofit Feeding our Future alone included nearly $300 million stolen from programs meant to feed children during the pandemic.

“We’re talking about fake invoices, meals that never existed, luxury cars and overseas investments — all paid for by American taxpayers,” he said.

The congressman claimed the fraud was not the result of “a paperwork error or a few bad actors slipping through the cracks,” but rather “a sustained failure of leadership.”

“Gov. Walz and Attorney General Ellison were warned repeatedly,” he said. “Auditors raised red flags, employees sounded alarms, invoices didn’t make sense, and still, the money kept flowing.”