Minnesota’s moral grandstanding let a billion dollar fraud march on unchecked

The pandemic-era multibillion-dollar social services billing fraud perpetrated mostly by Somali immigrants in Minneapolis is shocking in its scale. It should surprise no one that Minnesota public officials turned a blind eye to one of the largest public welfare scandals in American history for fear of being seen as racists.

For years, the state has falsely convinced itself that its Black residents have a deeply racist history. Progressives made a significant mistake by confusing the situation of Black African new immigrants with that of the descendants of American slaves. But they were sure they had to set the record straight with dramatic policy changes.

This underappreciated story began with what appeared to be an alarming investigation by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune in 2019. Tagged Minnesota “one of the most racially unequal states”—a conclusion based on the fact that the Black poverty rate is four times higher than that of Whites. But this is the same state that warmly welcomed refugees fleeing the Somali civil war through Lutheran and Catholic social service groups; By 2024, approximately 107,000 residents of Somali descent will reside in Minnesota. The state had effectively imported large-scale Black poverty—but that had everything to do with immigration and nothing to do with Jim Crow and its legacy.

Scores of scammers are stealing taxpayer cash on luxury goods that are beyond the reach of most Americans, according to the Fed

Neighborhood-level poverty data tells the story. In the North Minneapolis Hawthorne neighborhood, which is among the poorest in the city, 38% of the residents are black and 21% are foreign nationals. In the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, 44.5% of residents are Black and 42% of the population is foreign-born.

But the paper attributed the economic deficit not to immigration but to “special advantages offered to the White population over time,” citing the “red line” (federal mortgage rules that barred blacks from buying homes in Minneapolis and many other American cities) but noted that they had been removed long before the Somalis arrived.

But Minneapolis took “how to be anti-racist” to the extreme. The city, led by liberal Mayor Jacob Frey, who was infamous for failing to quell the riots that followed the death of George Floyd, passed a law eliminating all single-family zoning in Minneapolis. He made it clear that this was a form of compensation. According to Mayor Frey: In a statement to Politico, he said the city continues “racist policies…implicitly through our zoning rules.” “Housing is inextricably linked to income, and every other system, especially in Minnesota, is failing people of color,” then-City Council President Lisa Bender continued.

Anti-racist rhetoric has overlooked the fact that there have long been racially integrated neighborhoods in a city and state that historically had a relatively small Black population (just 4.4% in 1970) before rising to over 18% today, thanks to Somali immigration.

GOP GOVERNORAL CHALLENGE ROBBINS SAYS WALZ IS ‘A ABSOLUTE FAILURE’ IN FIGHTING FRAUD

As I analyzed City MagazineIn one of the city’s wealthiest areas — which broke the story in October about fraudulent money potentially supporting a terrorist front group — 4.3% of households in one of the city’s wealthiest areas were African-American, compared with 7.4% in the metro area as a whole. The city’s Victory neighborhood is 18.3% African American, and 40% of its population is in the highest income category. It is both wealthy and racially integrated. Minneapolis had no reason for white people to feel guilty.

But the Star-Tribune story hit the beginning of “how to be an anti-racist era,” and Minneapolis was also confusing immigrant poverty with racism.

CLICK FOR OTHER OPINIONS OF FOX NEWS

So when a cop tragically overreacted while arresting George Floyd, the city and the country concluded that police practices, like zoning practices, were irredeemably racist. It was the same anti-zoning Mayor Frey who agreed to rioters setting fire to the city’s Third Precinct police station in the wake of Floyd’s death; this led the city to withdraw police in favor of social services. (New Yorkers can see the same playbook from Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani.)

In light of the allegedly racist backdrop of poverty in Somalia, state officials were unlikely to stop the flow of federal dollars going to fake food banks and autism treatment centers. It’s possible that Gov. Tim Walz viewed the influx of federal dollars as good news; This is one way to help close the so-called systemic black-white wealth gap. The right approach, of course, involves what was once called assimilation: ensuring Somalis learn English and acquire the skills necessary for upward mobility. That’s not exactly the agenda of Rep. Ilhan Omar, a prominent Somali-American who was once a refugee herself and was quick to condemn “systemic racism.”

It is difficult to understand the extreme racial sensitivity of Minnesota progressives. Minneapolis elected Sharon Sayles Benton, its first Black female mayor, in 1994; NFL star Alan Page became a state Supreme Court judge. And of course, there’s Prince’s Minneapolis-raised musical genius.

CLICK TO REACH THE FOX NEWS APPLICATION

The state had no reason to conclude that it was racist to crack down on welfare fraud among new immigrants from a country besieged by a corrupt government. But that’s what he did, following long-accumulated but misplaced white guilt.

Taxpayers did not just suffer financial losses. Residents of a state famous for its good governance will lose confidence in the government.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM HOWARD HUSOCK