Minnesota’s Republican congressional delegation and state lawmakers are calling on the U.S. Attorney’s office to investigate whether fraud schemes helped fund terrorism after President Donald Trump pledged that he would end temporary legal protections for Somali immigrants in Minnesota.

Trump’s move and GOP calls for an investigation come on the heels of a report from a conservative think tank alleging that some of the millions of dollars stolen from the state through fraud ended up in the hands of the Somalia-based Islamist terrorist group al-Shabaab.

It’s not the first time there have been allegations of a link between fraud in Minnesota and terrorism.

The same premise was at the center of a similar 2018 local news story that spurred action at the state Capitol and a nonpartisan state investigation that found no definitive connection between fraud and terrorism.

Citing unnamed sources and a former counterterrorism investigator, writers for City Journal, a publication of the Manhattan Institute, claim that some money sent back from Minnesota to Somalia through informal networks likely would have benefited the group, which controls large swaths of Somalia.

The report shows no definite link between hundreds of millions of dollars in fraud this decade in Minnesota and terrorist groups, though it asserts that al-Shabaab received cuts of money transferred from the U.S. to Somalia through the hawala system, an informal money transfer network used by the Somali diaspora.

City Journal’s source for this claim is Glenn Kerns, a former detective with the Seattle Police Department, who investigated hawala networks while working with a federal terrorism task force in the 2010s.

In 2018, then-retired Kerns shared similar findings with KMSP-TV, or Fox 9 — day care fraud in Minnesota and money transferred to areas controlled by al-Shabaab in Somalia. An agency whistleblower claimed $100 million in stolen tax dollars had gone overseas.

Legislative auditor investigation in 2018

A subsequent report by the nonpartisan Minnesota Office of the Legislative Auditor couldn’t substantiate claims that money went to terrorist groups overseas. The 2019 report found fraud, though there was no evidence that it reached $100 million.

OLA did acknowledge, however, that money obtained through fraud sent overseas could end up going to terrorists.

“We found that federal regulatory and law enforcement agencies are concerned that terrorist organizations in certain countries, including Somalia, obtain and use money sent from the United States by immigrants and refugees to family and friends in those countries,” the report said.

City Journal authors Ryan Thorpe and Christopher Rufo, a conservative activist and author who rose to prominence as an opponent of critical race theory in American education, cite Kerns’ work as a piece of evidence that money continues to fund the Somali terrorist group, as well as two unnamed sources.

For every dollar that is transferred from the Twin Cities back to Somalia, “Al-Shabaab is . . . taking a cut of it,” said one unnamed source described as a former member of the Minneapolis Joint Terrorism Task Force.

A second unnamed source claimed “the largest funder of Al-Shabaab is the Minnesota taxpayer.” It’s unclear, though, how much money the group might have received.

GOP calls for investigation

Members of the Minnesota Senate and House Republican caucuses sent letters to U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen on Monday asking Minnesota federal prosecutors to investigate the allegations. Minnesota U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer, U.S. Rep. Michelle Fischbach, U.S. Rep. Brad Finstad and U.S. Rep. Pete Stauber sent a similar letter on Friday.

Dozens of fraud cases have emerged in Minnesota in recent years, with much of it centered at the state’s Department of Human Services. Acting U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson estimated in July that fraud in the state could top $1 billion.

In the largest case, federal prosecutors allege a scheme centered around the nonprofit Feeding Our Future defrauded the government of $250 million in federal funds from a pandemic-era meal program. In that case, the money was administered by the Minnesota Department of Education.

“The notion that these dollars could be flowing to foreign terrorist organizations adds a truly disturbing additional element,” state House Republicans said in their letter. “If confirmed to be true, immediate action must be taken at the state and federal level to crack down on remittances and other payments that are making their way to terrorist organizations.”

DFL leaders condemn Trump’s move on protections

The office of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said it has not heard anything about the allegations from state or federal law enforcement. The U.S. Attorney’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

Democratic-Farmer-Labor leaders have condemned Trump’s pledge to revoke temporary protective status for Somali migrants in Minnesota, claiming the administration was using the report to pursue deportations as part of an anti-Muslim and xenophobic agenda.

Dozens, including U.S. Reps. Betty McCollum, Ilhan Omar, DFL legislators and activists gathered at the Capitol on Monday to address reporters. Omar said incidents of fraud could not be blamed on the Somali community at large.

“There is not a single (piece of) evidence that the president or his cronies have put forth that there are any single resource from taxpayers in Minnesota that has gone to aid and abet terrorism,” she said. “That language puts the lives of Somalis not only in Minnesota but across the country in danger. And if the president believed that and he had evidence, he would take people to court.”

A little over 700 Somalis have temporary protective status nationwide, with around 400 in Minnesota. The status protects immigrants from deportation. There are more than 80,000 Somalis in Minnesota, the most of any state.

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