Comer will accuse Walz of ignoring massive welfare fraud in Minnesota in a high-profile hearing

House Oversight Committee Republicans are preparing to confront Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Attorney General Keith Ellison in a critical hearing on welfare fraud Wednesday morning.

“While Governor Walz hesitated, taxpayers lost billions. Attorney General Ellison also said his office held fraudsters accountable, but when his statements were tested against the record, they fell apart,” said Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., according to prepared opening remarks obtained by Fox News Digital.

“We interviewed more than thirty detectives, most of whom are current employees and Democrats, who say they were ignored, retaliated against, and even targeted for raising their concerns. Instead of protecting whistleblowers, the Walz administration has protected a system that allows fraud.”

Hours before the hearing was set to begin, the committee released a 53-page report that accused Walz and Ellison of knowing about the alleged fraud much earlier than previously thought.

“Although the Committee continues to review documents and meet with the perpetrators, it is clear that Governor Walz and Attorney General Ellison knew about the fraud in government programs controlled by the State of Minnesota much earlier than they told the American people,” the report said.

“Transcripted interviews with current and former state officials from the state of Minnesota confirmed that Governor Walz and Attorney General Ellison were aware of the fraud [Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP)] and high-risk Medicaid programs administered by DHS in early spring 2019 and fraud [state food aid] programs managed by [the Minnesota Department of Education] early April 2020.”

Both Walz and Ellison have previously denied allegations that they allowed intentional fraud in Minnesota’s public programs, and accused Republicans of politicizing the situation.

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The high-profile hearing is the culmination of a months-long investigation by the House Oversight Committee into alleged fraud in Minnesota.

Earlier, the team interviewed current and former officials in the provincial government, including those who focus on food aid.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison testifies before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on February 12, 2026. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Federal prosecutors in Minnesota have charged multiple people stealing more than $240 million from the Federal Child Nutrition Program through the Minnesota-based nonprofit Feeding Our Future. However, the investigation has expanded to several government programs being investigated for possible fraud. Child care providers who receive government funding, especially in the Somali community, are also under scrutiny.

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And the committee’s report accused progressive state leadership of ignoring evidence of fraud in order to appease the Somali community in Minneapolis.

“The Committee found that Minnesota did not do enough to ensure that taxpayer dollars were being used properly and could have stopped the flow of money to fraudsters at any time but chose not to because of fear of political retribution from the politically active Somali community,” the report said.

“Further legislative efforts at the federal level are needed to prevent this massive waste, fraud, and abuse of public dollars from happening again.”

In his opening statement, Comer would call the scandal “one of the largest regulatory breaches ever examined by this Committee.”

“Billions of taxpayer dollars were stolen from welfare programs while warnings piled up, whistleblowers spoke, and federal officials chose delay and denial instead of action,” he said.

“Federal prosecutors estimate that nearly $9 billion may have been stolen from the fourteen Medicaid programs administered by the State of Minnesota. As our investigation has shown, it happened because the state’s leadership failed, repeatedly, to intervene. What we found in Minnesota is not the fault of paperwork or a few bad actors who ended up backing down because of leadership failure.

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Meanwhile, Democrats on the committee accused Comer of trying to interfere with President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigrants in Minneapolis – which included the killing of two US citizens by federal agents.

“I encourage people to watch those videos and see for themselves what happened. And I hope that this committee investigates this incident and that we are fully responsible,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., during a previous hearing on Minnesota fraud.

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