Is 89% of the fraud in Minnesota being caused by somalians?
Executive summary
There is no credible evidence that "89%" of all fraud in Minnesota is caused by Somalians; reporting documents large, high-profile fraud schemes with many Somali defendants but does not establish that proportion statewide, and some politicians’ claims of "up to 90%" are unsubstantiated in the available reporting [1] [2]. Federal and state probes have uncovered massive schemes tied to specific programs and organizations—some involving many Somali defendants—but investigators and auditors have not produced a verified statistic that 89% of all Minnesota fraud stems from people of Somali origin [3] [4].
1. What the claim would have to mean — and why the data don’t show it
For the statement "89% of the fraud in Minnesota is caused by Somalians" to be true it would require comprehensive, audited accounting of fraud losses across every federal, state, and local program in Minnesota with ethnicity or national-origin attribution and a clear methodology attributing losses to individuals of Somali origin; no such statewide, methodologically transparent accounting appears in the reporting, and authorities mentioned are pursuing audits and pauses in payments rather than publishing a single statewide percentage breakdown by community [3] [2].
2. What reporting actually documents: major schemes, many Somali defendants
Investigative coverage and federal prosecutions have focused on very large schemes—like Feeding Our Future and other pandemic-era and social-services scams—that involved dozens of defendants and hundreds of millions of dollars in alleged losses, and reporters note that a substantial share of those defendants in several prosecutions have been members of Minnesota’s Somali community [5] [4] [6]. The New York Times, CNN and PBS document political fallout and community impact but stop short of asserting that those prosecutions equal 89% of all fraud statewide [2] [7] [8].
3. Where the "90%" rhetoric comes from and how it’s used politically
Public figures including former President Trump and some Republican officials have amplified figures such as "up to 90%" when discussing Somali involvement in Minnesota fraud, and fact-checking and explanatory reporting flag those claims as politically charged and not backed by a comprehensive statistical audit in the public record [1] [2]. Congressional hearings and political messaging emphasize that "many" defendants are Somali in certain high-profile cases, a framing that advances calls for tougher federal measures while also generating backlash from Somali leaders who say the whole community is being stigmatized [9] [8].
4. The nuance the data and sources show: concentrated fraud, not community-wide culpability
Sources show that many prosecutions arise from concentrated schemes centered on particular nonprofits, providers, or programs—some of which recruited within Somali networks—so accountability and criminality have been demonstrated in specific cases, not as a blanket attribute of an entire ethnic community, and federal investigators have not tied these prosecutions to a claim that Somalis are responsible for nearly nine-tenths of all fraud across Minnesota’s many programs [5] [6] [4].
5. Motives, agendas, and the risk of overgeneralization
Coverage reveals competing agendas: lawmakers and commentators seeking policy change and political advantage, oversight committees spotlighting taxpayer losses, and advocates warning that emphasizing defendants’ ethnicity can inflame xenophobia and distract from systemic controls failures; several outlets explicitly caution against conflating the actions of the accused with the broader Somali community, which numbers around 100,000–108,000 people in Minnesota and includes many law-abiding residents whose reputations have been affected [7] [2] [8].
6. Bottom line
The available reporting documents serious, large-scale fraud prosecutions in Minnesota that include many Somali defendants in specific schemes, but it does not substantiate the claim that 89% of all fraud in the state is caused by Somalians; assertions of a precise 89–90% figure are political rhetoric rather than a citation of a comprehensive audited statistic, and responsible interpretation requires distinguishing concentrated criminal conspiracies from broad-brush community attribution [4] [1] [3].