GOP lawmaker begs MAGA to stop spreading conspiracies connecting Democrat’s murder to Minnesota fraud case
A Minnesota Republican state senator is urging fellow conservatives to stop peddling implausible conspiracy theories tied to the killing of Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman. Fraud scandal currently shaking the state.
“I am a Republican legislator in Minnesota. I have never agreed with Melissa. Not once. But I implore people to stop sharing this conspiracy theory,” said State Senator Julia Coleman. he tweeted In response to actor, producer and socialite Sara Foster, who said Hortman’s death was “related” to the controversy. Foster, the daughter of media mogul David Foster, most recently served as co-head of creative for Bumble and co-produced the Netflix hit. Nobody Wants This with her sister Erin Foster.
Recently, The MAGA world went crazy It’s about the sprawling lawsuit alleging nearly $9 billion in federal funds supporting more than a dozen state-run child care and Medicaid programs in Minnesota may have been stolen.
“The fraud is not small. It is not singular. Its magnitude cannot be overstated,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Thompson Thompson. he said earlier this month. “What we’re seeing in Minnesota isn’t a bunch of bad actors committing crimes. This is fraud on a staggering, industrial scale.”
The investigation became politically and culturally fraught because 82 of the 92 defendants charged were Somali American; This has led Donald Trump and other prominent Republicans to claim that Somali immigrants are “defrauding this state” while calling Minnesota a “hub of fraudulent money laundering activity.”
Months after Melissa Hortman was killed in what law enforcement is calling a politically motivated shooting, conspirators are now linking her murder to a Minnesota fraud case (Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)
Trump also used the scandal as a way to demonize and denigrate Somalis as a whole, calling them “trash” and claiming they “contributed nothing,” prompting cries of racism and xenophobia from Democrats and liberals. Meanwhile, the president further escalated his bigoted remarks as he called for Somali-born Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) to be kicked “out of the country.”
Right-wing media and the Trump administration stepped up their focus on the fraud case after MAGA YouTuber Nick Shirley, speaking at a White House “counter Antifa violence” roundtable last week, posted a video of himself visiting day care centers in Minnesota.
At one point in the video, Shirely visits a Somali educational center with a misspelled sign claiming to have received $4 million in funding, and asks the owners about the money they received and the whereabouts of the children allegedly enrolled at the facility. This interaction went viral on social media and Launched by Vice President JD Vance and FBI Director Kash Patel said this “This is just the tip of a very large iceberg.”
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who is facing harsh criticism from the GOP and the White House over his fraud case as he runs for a third term. He responded this week by stating: He said he had “worked for years to tackle fraud and ask the state legislature for more authority to take aggressive action.”
His office also added that Walz “hired an outside firm to audit payments to high-risk programs, completely shut down the Housing Stabilization Services program, appointed a new statewide program integrity director, and supported criminal prosecutions.”
Sara Foster floated an uninvestigated conspiracy theory that the Hortman assassination was linked to an alleged fraud scheme in Minnesota
Amid the laser-focused attention the fraud investigation has received across the right-wing media ecosystem, Foster, who hosts a podcast with her sister, joined the social media fray over the weekend to wildly speculate that Hortman’s murder was linked to an alleged fraud scheme in the state.
Foster became increasingly critical. “far left” In recent years they have been calling them “the biggest tyrants” and accusing them of “liberal” politicians Besides the stabbing of San Francisco Cash App founder “tribal leaders” for wildfires in Southern California.
“So we’re planning to pretend that her murder isn’t connected to the multibillion-dollar fraud scandal that just came out? Mmmmkay,” he said. sent to x sharing on saturday June tweet From Nick Sortor, a far-right extremist who was pushing his own conspiracy theory at the time.
“HERO! Rep. Melissa Hortman sounded absolutely TERRIBLE as she spoke to the media after voting NO on illegal health care,” Sortor wrote at the time. “He was assassinated just this morning. He knew he would become a target one way or another.”
In the days after Hortman and her husband were murdered in their home, allegedly by anti-abortion evangelist Vance Boelter, Elon Musk and Sen. Prominent conservatives like Mike Lee (R-UT) emerged.) – falsely claimed He claimed that a “Marxist” killed Hortman because “the far left is capable of lethal violence.” At the same time, some suggested Walz was responsible for the assassination, wondering if the governor “had him executed to send a message.”
Foster’s tweet received 1.8 million views, more than 50,000 likes and more than 13,000 reshares; Other celebrities also confirmed his unfounded theory. Movies star Alison Lohman Drag Me to Hell And matchstick men, reacted with several bullseye emojis, but later appeared to delete the reaction.
“We need justice for Rep. Melissa Hortman,” said conservative State Rep. Heather Scott (R-ID) reacted Foster’s tweet: other pro-Trump accounts “If you go against the family, you pay the price,” he said, while sharing photos of Walz labeling him as a “fake dad.”
Republican lawmaker Julia Coleman called out Foster last weekend for suggesting that Hortman’s murder was linked to the Minnesota fraud case
Telling Foster and others to stop peddling conspiracy theories about Hortman’s death, Coleman explained why the now-deceased Democratic leader was emotional in the clip Sortor shared months ago.
“She’s not afraid in this video. She’s crying because she had to take this vote to keep the government open and it was incredibly hard for her,” Coleman wrote. “That’s who he was as a leader. Even though I didn’t agree with him, I could tell his heart was definitely in this and the weight of his decisions sometimes wore on his sleeve.”
Coleman added that “the hit list includes people who didn’t get the same vote.” A note left by Boelter in his vehicle Among them: Walz, Omar and Sens. There were about 70 other targets, including Tammy Baldwin, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith.
The Republican lawmaker continued: “Tim Walz had nothing to do with the assassinations. Fraud had nothing to do with the assassinations.” “The assassin was out of his mind. Completely and utterly out of his mind. And Minnesota lost a good woman because of it.”
Coleman wrapped up his lengthy rebuttal on social media with a final message to Foster and others peddling these claims. “Please stop trying to take social media credit for the death of a good person you know nothing about, unless you have proof,” he declared.
Independent He has reached out to Foster’s representatives for comment.
