Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Tuesday that he has "zero credibility" on fraud, escalating a public clash that broke out hours after federal agents executed roughly two dozen search warrants across the Twin Cities in a long-running investigation into the alleged theft of taxpayer dollars from Medicaid-funded childcare and autism programs.
The FBI, joined by Homeland Security Investigations and state and local partners, executed 22 federal search warrants at daycares, businesses, and homes in the Minneapolis area, a federal official told CNN.
Five of those sites were tied to four businesses participating in a state program that serves children with autism, and the Minnesota Medicaid Fraud Control Unit assisted at those locations, the state attorney general's office said.
The majority of the warrants targeted child and daycare providers who receive Medicaid funding.
Walz welcomed the operation and sought to claim a share of the credit, saying that state agencies had first flagged the irregular activity.
"Today's raids by state and federal law enforcement happened because our state agencies caught irregular behavior and reported it," he wrote on X.
"That's how the system is supposed to work, and our agencies will keep at it as long as there are fraudsters around to put behind bars."
Trump administration officials pushed back hard.
Mullin, sworn in last month as the ninth Homeland Security secretary, replied directly to the governor on X.
"You have zero credibility on this issue," he wrote, accusing Walz of having "willingly ignored and downplayed the rampant fraud and abuse in Minnesota" and crediting President Trump for the crackdown.
FBI Director Kash Patel followed with his own rebuke, saying federal agencies "drafted and executed every search warrant today."
The exchange landed at a politically raw moment.
Walz dropped his reelection bid in January under mounting scrutiny over fraud in state-administered programs, and the Trump administration has since temporarily suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicaid payments to Minnesota over what it calls fraud concerns, a move Walz has called political punishment.
The probe traces back to the Feeding Our Future case, a nonprofit accused of stealing hundreds of millions in federal funds, and dozens of defendants have been charged since the investigation began in 2022.
It has since expanded into childcare, autism services, and other Medicaid-funded programs.
A Minnesota House oversight committee held a hearing on childcare assistance the same morning as the raids; Republican chair Kristin Robbins said Walz had been invited to testify and declined.
Minneapolis sought to keep its distance.
The city said in a statement on X that it was not involved in Tuesday's federal operations and that police had not been asked to assist.
The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension confirmed its agents helped execute warrants across the metro area.
No charges tied to Tuesday's warrants had been announced as of Tuesday evening.
Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.
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