House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., said he is prepared to subpoena Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as part of the panel’s investigation into a large-scale fraud scheme that allegedly involved hundreds of millions of dollars in state aid being funneled through nonprofits to Somali immigrants and other recipients.Comer’s comments come amid intensifying scrutiny of Minnesota’s oversight of its aid programs and growing calls from Republican lawmakers for additional federal review, Just the News reported.
“If anyone that has received correspondence from us thus far requesting information, if they don’t turn over that information, then they will get a subpoena. And we’re serious about this. We’re not going to back down,” Comer told the outlet this week.
The alleged fraud scheme — involving nonprofits such as “Feeding Our Future” and carried out largely by individuals of Somali descent, according to prosecutors — is believed to have siphoned more than $1 billion in taxpayer funds by submitting claims for child nutrition, housing assistance and autism therapy services that were never provided during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Comer told Just the News that Walz and other Minnesota Democratic officials, including Attorney General Keith Ellison, have “hid” as federal and state investigations continue, arguing that their cooperation will be necessary to determine how the alleged misconduct went undetected for so long.
“You know, Walz gets due process, but the way he’s handling this, and the way Ellison, the attorney general, has kind of hid right now, makes me pretty confident that there’s a massive amount of waste, fraud and abuse that’s about to be detected here, and I’m going to predict that Walz’s political career is closer to an end than somewhere in the middle,” Comer said.
Amid allegations that some of the proceeds may have reached the Somali terrorist organization Al-Shabaab, the scandal has prompted federal investigations, renewed political scrutiny of Governor Walz’s administration over oversight failures, and heightened tensions within Minnesota’s sizable Somali community.
Republican lawmakers have argued for years that Democratic-led social programs are vulnerable to waste and abuse.
Their concerns gained additional traction earlier this year when the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) reviewed and ultimately canceled several USAID contracts that funded a wide range of international initiatives — including LGBT-related programming in Guatemala and a $20 million children’s television project in Iraq, the outlet reported.
Comer repeated the sentiment and went on to suggest that it wasn’t an outlier or anomoly.
“I think what we’re going to find in Minnesota is probably happening in many other states. Minnesota could be, and hopefully is, the worst offender, but there are other blue states run by Democratic [Party] governors who refuse to turn over any data, not only to Congress, but to cabinet secretaries like Brooke Rollins who are trying to get a handle on programs like SNAP,” he told the outlet.
During his tenure leading the investigation, Comer released bank records indicating that Hunter Biden received approximately $6.5 million from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, where he served on the board despite having no formal background in the energy sector.
Former business associate Devon Archer testified that Hunter Biden placed his father, then–Vice President Joe Biden, on speakerphone more than 20 times during conversations with foreign partners, describing the practice as part of leveraging the “Biden brand.”
Comer has also highlighted allegations that Joe Biden’s push in 2015 for the removal of Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin occurred at the same time Burisma executives were reportedly expressing concern to Hunter Biden about needing protection from legal scrutiny.
Meanwhile, Newsweek reported that an account on X, claiming to represent 480 staff members at the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS), said Walz, who served as former vice president Kamala Harris’ running mate in 2024, “has failed Minnesota.” In another post, they added: “Tim Walz is 100% responsible for massive fraud in Minnesota.”
