The Justice Department on Thursday announced criminal charges against 15 people in Minnesota accused of defrauding Medicaid and several other state-run social services programs of more than $90 million.
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“The fraud here in Minnesota is shocking,” said Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald during a press conference in Minneapolis. “This is not the end of our work.”
Top officials, including Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz, joined McDonald in Minneapolis to announce the charges.
The defendants are also accused of defrauding programs meant to provide housing and meals for those in need, as well as services for disabled people and autistic children, according to McDonald.
He accused two of the people of defrauding $46.6 million from a publicly funded program meant to provide medical services to children with autism. The defendants allegedly “paid kickbacks to parents who brought their children to autism centers, diagnosed children with autism regardless of medical necessity, and billed for autism services that were never actually provided,” McDonald said.
Kennedy described the scheme as “organized theft that exploited the most vulnerable children in America, deceived families, stole taxpayer dollars meant to help children with autism access legitimate care and support.”
“We will not allow criminals to treat children as billing opportunities while American taxpayers foot the bill,” Kennedy said.
Similarly, in other alleged schemes, prosecutors say defendants filed fraudulent claims to Medicaid and other bogus claims for services that were never provided. Eleven defendants were accused of defrauding three separate programs helping people with disabilities live independently, resulting in more than $39.1 million in losses, according to the DOJ.
The charges announced Thursday “include the highest loss amount ever charged in a Medicaid case in Minnesota, and the largest autism fraud scheme ever charged by the Department of Justice,” McDonald said.
The announcement coincided with the sentencing of Aimee Bock, the former leader of a Minnesota nonprofit who was convicted in a $250 million fraud case deemed the nation’s “single largest COVID-19 fraud scheme.”
Bock’s case and many other overlapping fraud cases, some involving members of Minnesota’s Somali community, were initially used by President Donald Trump and his administration to justify the launch of a large-scale immigration operation in the state that lasted nearly three months.
Called “Operation Metro Surge,” Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota drew massive protests, led to tense confrontations between immigration officers and residents, and resulted in the killings of two U.S. citizens.
Still, the federal government has remained focused on rooting out alleged fraud in Minnesota.
In March, the White House launched a nationwide initiative chaired by Vice President JD Vance to combat fraud. Since then, the Trump administration has halted some Medicaid funding for Minnesota and frozen Medicare enrollments for some hospice and home health care agencies, KARE 11, NBC’s affiliate in Minneapolis, reported.
McDonald said the DOJ also plans to expand its Health Care Fraud Strike Force operation in the Midwest with 15 additional prosecutors who will focus on combating Medicaid fraud in Minnesota as well as nationwide.
