OAN Staff Addie Davis and Brooke Mallory
3:08 PM – Tuesday, April 28, 2026
Authorities confirmed that federal agents executed a coordinated series of raids across the Twin Cities metro area on Tuesday morning as part of an ongoing investigation into large-scale fraud.
The morning’s enforcement actions targeted multiple locations throughout the Minneapolis-St. Paul region — a significant escalation in relation to a federal probe into financial misconduct.
While specific details regarding the suspects remain sealed, the operation was described by officials as a major step in disrupting fraudulent activity within the state.
“HSI, in cooperation with its federal, state and local law enforcement partners, engaged in court-authorized law enforcement operations in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area,” Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) posted to social media.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) further emphasized that HSI is “zeroing in on the rampant fraud of taxpayer dollars in Minnesota.”
“We will stop at nothing to end the defrauding of the American people,” DHS added.
The Trump administration has intensified its efforts to combat financial misconduct following the exposure of ongoing fraud schemes across the country, with significant cases surfacing in Minnesota and California.
In a proactive move to centralize these enforcement efforts, President Donald Trump also signed an executive order in March establishing the Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, an initiative spearheaded by Vice President JD Vance.
Complementing this executive action, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche later announced the launch of the National Fraud Enforcement Division within the Department of Justice (DOJ) earlier this April, signaling a coordinated federal pivot toward investigating and prosecuting large-scale illicit activity.
“The task force and the DOJ will be relentless in exposing these fraudsters wherever they may be hiding,” the vice president said, when commenting on the raids.
According to incoming reports, federal authorities executed more than 20 criminal search warrants on Tuesday as part of an extensive fraud investigation targeting a network of childcare facilities — the majority of which are Somali-owned.
Sources emphasized that the operation was strictly focused on financial misconduct rather than immigration enforcement.
Among the sites reportedly raided was the Quality Learning Center, a facility that gained notoriety after being featured in a December 2025 video by conservative journalist and YouTuber Nick Shirley, which showed widespread systemic fraud within certain childcare centers.
Amidst the federal activity, the City of Minneapolis clarified its stance by announcing that local municipal resources were not participating in the ongoing operations.
“The City of Minneapolis is not involved in the federal operations being reported around Minnesota today, and as of 9:30 a.m., MPD has not been asked to assist with the execution of federal warrants,” the city posted to X on Tuesday.
“We understand that any federal actions in our neighborhoods may spark fear among residents, and we will continue to marshal City resources to help the community in the aftermath of Operation Metro Surge,” it added.
Operation Metro Surge was a prior immigration enforcement initiative in the Twin Cities, resulting in a heightened presence of officers and an uptick in regional operations.
Meanwhile, while acknowledging the situation at hand, Governor Tim Walz (D-Minn.) confirmed the scale of the ongoing Tuesday operations, though local officials have worked to distinguish these immigration-related actions from the concurrent, unrelated federal fraud investigations in the area.
“If you commit fraud in Minnesota you’re going to get caught—and that’s exactly what we saw today. We catch criminals when state and federal agencies share information. Joint investigations work, and security justice depends on it,” the governor said.
“Today’s raids by state and federal law enforcement happened because our state agencies caught irregular behavior and reported it. 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,” he continued.
Nonetheless, Walz drew criticism later on Tuesday after attributing the success of the federal fraud raids in Minneapolis to state efforts — a move that triggered a correction from FBI Director Kash Patel.
“This FBI and DOJ with our DHS partners drafted and executed every search warrant today. But go ahead and take credit for our work while we smoke out the fraud plaguing Minnesota under your governorship,” the FBI director stated.
Walz’s social media post garnered over a million views within hours, only to be met with a wave of criticism from conservatives. Detractors were quick to reiterate that the extensive fraud schemes occurred during his tenure, arguing that the resulting public outcry was the primary factor that compelled him to abandon his gubernatorial re-election campaign.
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