St. Cloud, Oct 30, 2026: Bessent, Patel, Oz and Ferguson announce the federal 'War on Fraud'

2026-10-30 · video

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Source: Forbes Breaking News (White House pool feed) · watch the original on YouTube. Played here unaltered except as noted on this page; rights remain with the publisher.

Root source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHU_VY1cjYA

What it establishes: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, FBI Director Kash Patel, CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson and Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald at the St. Cloud Police Department, the day after FBI agents served 17 search warrants in the Twin Cities. Bessent: a $25 million whistleblower fund and 'ground zero' for fraud; Patel: four arrests and a 26-count indictment; Oz on Housing Stabilization. White House pool feed as streamed by Forbes Breaking News; the 25-minute holding slate before the first speaker and the closing slate are cut, nothing else.

Transcript (machine transcript; quotations are checked against the video before use: whisper.cpp large-v3 on the hosted file; speaker labels added by hand from the video)

Announcer Please welcome the Secretary of the Treasury, Scott Bessent
Scott Bessent, Treasury Secretary Good afternoon, and thank you all for being here today.
I'm pleased to be joined by FBI Director Kash Patel, CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz,
Oz, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, and Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald, as we bring
new force to the fight against fraud.
President Trump has made clear that the war on fraud is not the work of one department,
but a mandate that we must carry across the entire administration.
I am proud to stand alongside so many dedicated colleagues who are delivering on that mandate
every day.
America is a generous country, and the compassion of our people imposes a corresponding duty
on our government.
That is why I visited Minnesota in January to make clear that the U.S. Treasury is deploying
every tool to bring an end to this egregious, unchecked fraud and hold perpetrators to account.
Over the past year, Treasury returned $175 million in payments that would have gone to
deceased individuals and expanded the do not pay access from four to 99 percent of federal programs
further we've stopped almost 190 million and returned over 100 million in funds to u.s
victims of overseas fraud ordered an audit of approximately 9 billion in treasury contracts
and together with our partners at the irs proposed stronger eligibility checks for health insurance
tax credits. These actions form one front of a whole-of-government effort led by Vice President
Vance. The Vice President's task force first convened in March, and he has worked tirelessly
to restore vigilance and responsible stewardship in the management of public money. Since January
2025, the Trump administration has uncovered more than $260 billion in fraud, prevented $72 billion
in taxpayers' funds from going out the door to illicit actors annually and brought enforcement
actions against nearly $60 billion. Nowhere is the work more urgent than here in Minnesota.
In the weeks following my visit, Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network,
known as FinCEN, issued a geographic targeting order to trace criminal networks
that divert funds overseas and ensure that taxpayer dollars go to the American people,
not terror groups like al-Shabaab. We have ongoing investigations at home and abroad into al-Shabaab,
its networks, and its enablers. Since the start of the Trump administration,
FinCEN data have also supported the law enforcement effort that led to the arrest
and charging of 115 fraudsters as well as 75 convictions and nearly 3 000 subpoenas across
minnesota and just yesterday irsci assisted with investigative activity at several sites suspected
of fraud i want to give a shout out to our great officers at irsci they don't get much press but
but they are quietly one of the most effective groups
in the United States government for fighting fraud.
Today, FinCEN released additional information
to help refer new leads to law enforcement
and provide support to ongoing investigations.
We issued a notice to help financial institutions identify,
report suspicious activity,
especially those involving charities and nonprofits.
The notice highlights how criminals exploit
fundraising capabilities to facilitate terrorist financing, fraud, and other illicit activity.
FinCEN also issued an alert on the risk associated with cross-border transactions
originated by money service businesses known as MSBs. The alert details how bad actors can exploit
MSBs to move funds overseas. FinCEN identified over eight billion dollars in potentially suspicious
foreign agent directed payments between 2021 and 2025 alone and today's alert urges financial
institutions to be vigilant in detecting identifying and reporting suspicious activity
arising from certain cross-border payments including u.s based msbs the next phase of this
fight meanwhile will make it easier than ever for whistleblowers who know where the fraud is
to help lead us to it. Until now, any citizen who detected fraud was forced to navigate
a maze of tip lines scattered across law enforcement agencies. No more. For the first
time, we've created a single centralized portal at america.gov/fraud. Treasury is proud to seed
this new 25 million fraud whistleblower incentive program. Anyone who submits information that leads
to a conviction or enforcement action may be eligible for a $30,000 reward. Speaking up has
long carried a cost for whistleblowers. Under President Trump, it can offer a reward. Now the
industrial-scale fraud that Tim Walz shamefully, and perhaps knowingly, allowed to fester is the
defining legacy of his administration. But with President Trump back in office, Washington is no
longer content to watch Minnesota's fraud epidemic spiral from a distance. The days of indifference
are over, and under this president's leadership, wherever the money leads, the full weight of
government will follow. Now I'm pleased to turn it over to someone who has helped give the fight
against fraud both its discipline and its force, FBI Director Kash Patel.
Kash Patel, FBI Director Thank you, Scott. This FBI follows the money. This FBI will put in prison anyone who commits
fraud anywhere in the world against any American citizen. Thanks to President Trump, we finally
have a Commander-in-Chief who prioritized the initiative to go after the fraudsters with the
full force of government. Thanks to the Vice President for leading the Anti-Fraud Task Force
with our Department of Justice partners and the Assistant Attorney General, Colin McDonald.
And thanks to this great team here with Chairman Ferguson, with Dr. Oz, with our state and local
partners. It is an interagency lift. As the Secretary said, it is a whole-of-government
approach, and the results we are delivering are truly historic. We're here today to announce that
just yesterday, FBI Minneapolis and our partners executed 17 search warrants in a single day
to combine into a 26-count indictment. Three of those search warrants were at a child care center.
Two of those search warrants were at the residences of the owners of those centers,
and two more of those search warrants were on the Early Intensive Development and Behavioral
Intervention Unit here in Minnesota. FBI Minneapolis and our interagency partners
arrested four of the alleged fraudsters. Faizal Emi, Aspen Associates, 11 counts of health care
fraud, 8 million in intended loss. Jama Mohammed, American Home Health Care, six counts of health
care fraud, $3.27 million in intended loss. Faiza Ahmed, home sweet home, eight counts of health
care fraud, $10 million in intended fraud. And Habiba Mohammed, smart therapy, one count of
conspiracy to defraud the United States, totaling nearly $20 million in intended fraud and loss.
The subjects intended to defraud thousands of victims of over $41 million, money that was supposed to go to those in need with our precious taxpayer dollars funding that bill.
Instead, they thought they could get away with their crimes.
They did not succeed because of this team and the president and vice president's anti-fraud task force.
We are going to continue working with our state and local partners and the interagency to dismantle, disrupt, and take down fraud networks wherever they are, in Minnesota right here in St. Cloud and everywhere else in the country.
The FBI's initiative under the Vice President's FBI's Most Wanted Fraudsters list has also seen historic achievements.
In just four months after launching the list, we captured four of the most wanted fraudsters on four separate continents who are on the run for nearly 5,000 days who defrauded Americans of $2 billion.
There is no other administration in U.S. history that has set out on such an initiative.
We set out on it, we delivered for the American people, and we're going to continue manhunting fraudsters in every corner of the earth.
Right here in Minnesota, the Feeding Our Futures program has achieved historic success in terms of our investigation.
We have charged, thanks to our Department of Justice partners, 81 subjects.
Seventy have already been convicted and their fraud value is over one half billion dollars.
These communities will no longer be ravaged by these fraudsters who come here to siphon away our precious dollars from our most needy, our senior citizens and our children.
this FBI is proud to stand with the Trump administration and Vice President Vance's
leadership and our interagency partners and know this to any fraudsters who continue
or think they will continue to defraud Americans this FBI will continue to follow the money
we will continue to work with our interagency partners and we will put every last one of you
in prison I'm truly thankful of FBI Minneapolis our SAC and the entire FBI squad in Minneapolis
for me as your director thank you for working tirelessly to this effort and most importantly
thank you for being a partner in this team. It is truly an interagency lift and we are here to
deliver these historic results. It's a great day to be here in Minnesota. It's a great day for
America because the world knows we are not just watching fraud. We're taking action and we're
kicking butt. And now it's my honor to introduce my dear friend and one of the champions of the
Dr. Mehmet Oz, CMS Administrator anti-fraud movement. Dr. Oz. In many ways, the war on fraud, our nation's war on fraud, started
right here in Minnesota. It's not an issue to be proud about, it's just a reality, and we have been
doing a lot of work in Minnesota, as we have in many other states, because the problems we identified
here are not unique to Minnesota, but they were particularly evident in Minnesota. Since the
inauguration of these programs that the president again assigned the vice president to run this
anti-fraud task force we've embarked on an unprecedented quest to crush fraud and corruption
here and nationwide the network of crime the river of criminal activities runs deeper than we ever
thought possible and today we're going to put another face to the kind of bad behavior that
we're detecting and preventing yes director patel has agreed to help me this is charmaine meadows
We want to put a name and a face to some of the things we're talking about.
Earlier this month, Charmaine was not just indicted, she was convicted by a federal jury for stealing over $3.5 million for the now defunct Minnesota Medicaid Housing Stabilization Services Program.
There's many cautionary tales here, so I'm going to spend a few moments to bring alive what we are doing at the national level with one individual here in Minnesota.
This program, the Medicaid Housing Program, was designed to keep homeless and disabled seniors who were suffering serious conditions,
the exact kind of people you want to put your hand out and help back up again.
It was designed to help keep them out of institutions, which would also save taxpayer dollars.
And by helping them get comfortable and stable housing, it was supposed to achieve that.
But Charmaine and fraudsters like her don't want that to happen,
and they act in ways that obscure the process that could have allowed it to occur.
The program was so overrun with corruption that it ballooned from being about a $2.5 million program when it was first established in 2020, just five or six years ago, to over $100 million in 2024.
That is a 40-fold increase in four years.
That's impossible to stand.
If you're even paying a slight bit of attention to what you're doing, you would never let that happen.
Unfortunately, it looks like that was the norm in many instances.
Minnesota shut the program down.
I'm going to say that again.
This housing stabilization program, which everyone on this stage thinks has merit, was shut down because of fraudsters like Charmaine Meadows.
Now, she billed more hours than possible.
She hired untrained individuals overseas.
She did unspeakable things that broke the very integrity of this valuable program, leading to it being completely removed.
They're no longer offering those services to worthy folks living in Minnesota who could benefit from them.
That is the price we pay for allowing Charmaine Meadows to not only say, this is her website, by the way.
I couldn't Photoshop this.
It's exactly what you see, proven, personalized, profitable.
That last word, of course, being the operative one.
Now, no one's getting housing services.
Let's get back to Charmaine.
She built a program for housing services that were never provided to vulnerable Medicaid beneficiaries who could have desperately used them.
She billed for services across multiple states and countries at a time.
At the same time, that is physically impossible to provide services all at once.
Her employees were doing more than 20 hours per day of work.
Again, she claims not really happening.
And that unfortunately led to people even in the hospital being offered services, which, again, not legal and physically impossible.
A telltale sign of fraud.
That's how we shut down people like Charmaine and her colleagues like hers.
We go after them, folks like Kash Patel, Treasury Secretary Besset, and the law enforcement teams here in Minnesota and elsewhere went after her, and she's going to jail.
Now, that's the face of this problem.
Let's talk about how we actually deal with the issues.
Thank you.
The first major issue we have to do and accomplish nationwide is being able to revalidate providers.
That means specifically, are you really allowed to do the service that you're being told you can do?
Many of these programs got out of kilter because unlicensed individuals in unmonitored settings did unmeasured tasks that led to huge increases in taxes.
So revalidation asks, are you able and eligible to provide the services?
And to be eligible, by the way, you can't have been convicted as a felon.
You must be licensed in the state here in Minnesota, in this case, to own a business.
You've got to pass inspections.
You have to avoid being fired from Medicare or Medicaid in the past.
You cannot have been excluded from the programs.
We asked Minnesota to revalidate all of the high-risk providers here in Minnesota, 14 categories.
30%, almost one in three of all the people providing services in Minnesota could not be revalidated.
I'll say that again.
One in three people, roughly, who are providing services were not allowed to provide services.
That degree of fraud, again, you have to purposely be averting your glance to allow that to happen.
That is similar to what we're seeing in places like New York around social adult daycare.
And here in Minnesota, 50% of people in social adult daycare were not allowed to provide that service.
I have to ask a bigger question.
Should we be using federal tax dollars to pay people to play mahjong and card games as they hang out in clubhouses for crooks?
An issue for a separate day, perhaps, but one that comes to mind here.
The second big thing we did was start working closely with Treasury.
And I want to applaud Secretary Besson for being open to thoughts and, in fact, proactively helping us identify the real issue here, which is we are catching their Charmains of the world.
They're low-level street operators.
They're real capos.
They're real people at the top of the pyramid.
They keep getting away with this.
We need to go upstream to capture those folks.
We don't want the foot soldiers.
We want the people who hired the foot soldiers, the ones who hired them.
The Department of Treasury is the raft that will take us there.
I'm excited to announce that earlier this month, CMS signed a memorandum of understanding with Treasury that will help figure out who the real villains are and help us track where the money is going.
It's a formal cooperation between our agencies.
Again, the president and vice president have insisted on this.
It's an all-government effort, and this will allow us for the first time to collaborate in ways never before possible, at least at scale.
Secretary Bessent's team of forensic accountants are going to help us follow the money.
And they're using the FinCEN program that he mentioned earlier, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, and they're allowing us to use cross-referencing of enrollment records, of banking details, of OIG, Office of Inspector General, hotline tips, and the fraud prevention system in general.
So think of the godfather.
The godfather, you've got all these street operators doing all kinds of illicit activities, but the don, Don Corleone, he's actually taking the money at the top of the pyramid and siphoning it off.
That's how the multinational criminal organizations get their money.
That's why they're in America, because during COVID, we introduced the possibility of defrauding
the federal government at scale, especially in health care services, and they have taken
advantage of it.
So we're moving on to the big boys.
And the secretary just yesterday inaugurated a closer relationship with the IRS, which
is going to be a very valuable asset, because if people are lowly enough to steal from the
poor. If criminals take from the poor, they're almost certainly not paying their taxes. And so
by passing that information to the IRS, and the IRS, I have learned, has 2,900 gun-carrying
accountants, but they have a lot of accountants as well as the gun-carrying ones. They have an
enforcement arm, the criminal investigation arm, that they are working closely with us to identify
individuals. Because remember, these criminals, they don't steal the money without putting it
somewhere. They don't declare that money, because if you steal the money, you're not paying your
taxes, but you do sign your tax return. So we don't have to wait for all the things that normally we
have to fulfill in order to take action. The IRS has separate ability to enforce the law to prevent
these financial scams, as well as the tax evasion that takes place. This connects all the different
points together that allows us to help figure out exactly how the money is being stolen from the
poor. And just recently, this month, we connected the dots in California with hospice. We have
several hospices that we knew were sending the same money that they were stealing to one bank
account. We found that bank account had many other hospices that were pushing money into it as well.
It turned out it was one big web, one network of criminals, and we took the whole thing down by no
longer paying. And as soon as these criminals stop making money, they run away. This all-government
approach works because we have close personal relationships as well as working relationships.
Secretary Besson, thank you very much for standing up for the needs for us to work together as a
team in breaking down siloed barriers historically that have held us apart. Now let me introduce
another good friend, Colin McDonald. He's the Assistant Attorney General for Fraud Enforcement
who's done a yeoman's job pulling together so many disparate pieces in the quilt of law
Colin McDonald, Assistant Attorney General enforcement in this great nation. Colin. Thank you, Dr. Oz. 162 days ago, this team of public
servants announced the largest fraud takedown in Minnesota history. 15 new defendants charged
with federal felonies in schemes reaching more than $90 million in fraud.
We said then that those charges were just the beginning of our work to root out rampant
fraud in Minnesota.
And we meant it.
Today we're announcing just a sliver of the immense work underway to restore the rule
of law, safeguard taxpayer dollars, protect the vulnerable, and punish wrongdoers in Minnesota.
Just this week alone, five defendants have been charged with health care fraud offenses
in Medicaid fraud schemes involving more than $48 million in intended loss, including $29
million in schemes that have been uncovered for the first time.
This follows multiple defendants charged with SNAP benefits fraud last week.
And yesterday, in separate ongoing criminal investigations, the FBI and our law enforcement
partners executed numerous search warrants in a coordinated regional operation. The cases that
we are prosecuting involve fraudsters targeting tax dollars meant to help the most vulnerable
Americans. We are also activating all enforcement tools to recover stolen money. Last week we filed
a civil forfeiture complaint seeking to forfeit three properties in Minneapolis valued at
approximately $519,000 allegedly purchased with proceeds from a fraud
scheme that took money meant to feed our children. And our prosecutors and agents
are not only charging new cases, they are actively proving them in court and
ensuring real consequences for wrongdoers. Already this month, two fraud
defendants have been convicted at trial for their fraud schemes, including one
for defrauding a Minnesota housing program designed to help secure housing for the homeless.
The state of Minnesota was forced to shut down that program after costs skyrocketed from 2.5
million to 107 million in just four years. That was not supply and demand. That was fraud. And
as Dr. Oz mentioned, that program no longer exists because the fraudsters drained it dry.
And those homeless who needed that help no longer have that program because of fraudsters.
As for prison sentences, two days ago, Salim Saeed was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment
for his role in the Feeding Our Future fraud scheme.
He was responsible for more than $44 million in fraud proceeds and used the money to fund
his luxury lifestyle, including vehicles and a luxury home.
Just this morning, today, Saeed Farah was sentenced to 78 months in prison for his role in a scheme to bribe a juror during his prior fraud trial with $2,000 in cash delivered to the juror's home.
That is the fraud that we are confronting in this district in the state of Minnesota.
All told, over roughly the past 115 days, 14 fraud defendants in Minnesota have been sentenced to a combined total of 988 months in prison.
That is over 82 years of prison time for fraud crimes in this state.
And that does not count the 40-year sentence imposed for a Feeding Our Futures defendant earlier this year.
Ladies and gentlemen, that is the new normal, and fraudsters here should know it.
Now, these results do not happen automatically.
They require earnest, dedicated, experienced, talented public servants to do the work, like all of the individuals on the stage here with me.
I specifically commend U.S. Attorney Dan Rosen, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Tarab, the prosecutors in the Minnesota U.S. Attorney's Office,
and the prosecutors from the Fraud Division,
who have come from all over the country
to do this important work here in Minnesota.
They've come from Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey,
North Carolina, Virginia, Texas,
and other places from America
to confront the fraud epidemic here in Minnesota.
They are sacrificing time with their families
and children back home
to do the work of justice here in Minnesota.
We are not doing this work alone.
We are working hand in hand with the talented and dedicated agents and analysts with the
FBI, IRS-CI, HSI, HHS-OIG, the Postal Inspection Service, USDA-OIG, VA-OIG, and other law enforcement
partners to do this work, and I thank them all.
Let me be clear.
This is still the beginning of our work in Minnesota.
We will be here for as long as it takes to punish the wrongdoers in Minnesota, to deter
additional criminal conduct and restore the public's confidence in the rule of law.
And now it's my honor to welcome Chairman Andrew Ferguson to the podium.
Thank you, Colin.
Andrew Ferguson, FTC Chairman I think it's important to focus on something Colin said at the end when he listed how many
agencies are involved with this. There are some huge names that you see on TV all the time up here
that have done anti-fraud work. It takes thousands of prosecutors who you can't see up here, but who
we work with every day. Thousands of analysts within the agencies to figure out how the fraud
works to keep the money in the agency and send it to the right people, not the gangsters. Thousands
of law enforcement agents, not just from the FBI. The FBI, which has done incredible work here in
the United States and also has chased fraudsters who committed billions of dollars worth of fraud
to every corner of the planet to bring them home and face American justice. It's law enforcement
officers from HSI, from IRSCI, from the inspector general's offices of half a dozen agencies that
are spending thousands and thousands of man hours to chase down the fraudsters and bring them to
justice. President Trump said he wanted a whole of government effort and he got it in a way that
has not been replicated before in American history.
The law enforcement arms of every part of the government
are aimed squarely at the fraudsters.
We've heard a lot about the specific things
that are being done in Minnesota
and around the country today.
I just want to step back and explain why this matters.
Every American is a victim of fraud
because all of us pay into a system
that is being robbed and pirated by gangsters.
But it isn't just us as taxpayers that are victims here.
Fraud injures real people in the real world in a unique way.
We heard from Colin and from Dr. Oz how fraud ended a housing stabilization program here.
That means that veterans who needed help with housing in Minnesota are going without it
because fraudsters decide to use it as a piggy bank.
HHS uncovered massive skin substitute schemes where people were performing surgeries,
unnecessary surgeries on elderly Americans in order to make billions and billions of dollars.
DHS uncovered fraudulent truck driver licenses all throughout the country where illegal immigrants
were getting truck driver's licenses and then killing and maiming Americans on the road. Fraud
doesn't just hurt us all as taxpayers. It hurts Americans in the real world every single day.
That is why this fight matters.
The second reason that this fight matters is this system won't work.
Our benefit system won't work.
Our government won't work unless Americans have renewed trust in each other and in their
government.
Every morning, Americans wake up, go to work, and spend hours of their day working for the
government.
Money that never enters their hands goes to the federal government to fund these programs.
And we have all agreed, all American citizens have agreed amongst each other that we're going to fund these programs to help our families, our friends, and our neighbors in need.
How can we look American citizens in the eye and ask them to keep paying for these programs when for four years these programs were laid bare for pirates to rob to the tunes of hundreds of billions of dollars,
To take the money out of the pockets of American citizens, to take food out of the mouths of American children, to live a life of luxury.
We can't. This system won't survive.
The only way it survives is by pursuing the vision that President Trump laid out when he founded this task force and that the vice president has pursued with unbelievable vigor, which is the fraud stops.
Money stays in the agencies so that it goes to the people we've agreed we are actually going to help.
And when it does get out, Colin and Cash and the teams of prosecutors and law enforcement officers from every part of the federal government chase them to the ends of the earth and bring them to justice.
If we don't do this, if we don't win this fight, social trust will continue to degrade in this country, trust in government will continue to degrade, and these programs won't survive.
This fight is about saving the American system from the worst types of actors, fraudsters, pirates, and gangsters, and restoring America for Americans.
For four years, Minnesota was laid bare to fraud, and the federal government looked the other way.
Pirates and gangsters and thugs funded luxury lifestyles by taking money out of the pockets of hardworking American citizens.
President Trump, Vice President Vance, and Secretary Bessent have a very clear
message for all of them: enough is enough. We are putting American citizens first
just as the President promised in his election and just as we have tried to do
every single day. With that I'll turn it back over to Secretary Bessent.
Good, and I want to thank all of you. I think we can see that the results, while
While incomplete, they have been rapid, fulsome, and in many cases, the consequence is severe.
Questions and answers So I'd be happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
The first question will go to St. Claude Lange.
Hello. Throughout the last year or so, President Trump has mentioned that there is billions and
billions of dollars of fraud here. But the fraud that's been uncovered so far is well under that
figure. I think 19 billion was the total. When are we going to see that really high figures that's
been mentioned before? Well, as we can see, it's accelerating every day. And whether it's the
500,000, several million, it will continue to add up and as we heard today, the real tragedy
is that these programs are being shut down. I was at a round table here in January and I heard from
two parents who the program for autistic children, their children needed and attended had been shut
down so i think that as we work on this every day that we are uncovering more and as we heard
earlier we are getting the street level capos and we expect over the coming weeks and months
to secure arrest verdicts and recoveries from the kingpins thank you the next question will go to
I'm curious if you were able to touch on why you all picked St. Cloud as the location today.
We're aware of two raids down in the Twin Cities, if you can touch on that.
We were invited here.
The local assistant U.S. attorney suggested that we come here.
The government here is doing their best.
And, again, this is the center of the fraudulent activity is Minneapolis-St. Paul,
but this is all over the entire state.
The Walz administration has been woefully negligent and turned a blind eye
So, you know, every citizen of Minnesota is a victim, every town and city, the people are being defrauded.
Paul with NPR News.
Thank you. That was also my question.
Are any of these defendants specifically in St. Cloud or any of these businesses that you're targeting?
Can you talk about any investigations that are specifically related to St. Cloud?
We're not going to talk about ongoing investigations, but the fact that we are here should make you think that the greater region and the greater area here, that the task force is very interested in what's going on in this area.
K-A-R-E.
Thank you. If the administration has declared war on waste and fraud, could you explain
the $420 million overpayment for a prison in Appleton, Minnesota,
when the company offered it to the state of Minnesota for $75 million?
Yeah, I don't know anything about that. What we are here to do is to prosecute criminal fraud,
And any question like that that deflects away from it, I think, is a waste of our time.
Thanks.
Bob, nine.
So yesterday, Senate Democrats put out a report that accused CMS of targeting blue states with this task force.
They pointed out some $12.4 billion in fraud in Florida,
significant fraud, 5 to 10 billion a year in Texas. So I'm wondering if CMS feels like they're
holding other states, red states, purple states, to the same standards as they're holding Minnesota.
When I speak to Dr. Oz, he tells me that what's going on in his home state of Florida,
that there is substantial fraud going on there, many of it offshore, much of it in the medical
equipment industry so you know again the democrats having let this happen on their watch whether it's
here or in their states they are trying to deflect and it's going on everywhere and we're going to
track them down but i can tell you that the guard rails tend to be loosest in the democratic states
This kind of goes along the same lines as maybe some of the other questions about why you came to St. Cloud or Minnesota.
But per capita, I was wondering, because we can throw big numbers out, Texas, big state, Florida, big state.
Minnesota doesn't have the same population per capita.
Has it been that much worse here than other states?
Is that maybe why we're here?
Or can you talk a little bit about per capita where it's been the worst?
Yeah, well, I would say that we are at ground zero for per capita, given the population of Minnesota and this fraud that we've seen.
And it's ongoing.
And the kind of egregious nature of this and the lack of oversight from the AG's office and from the Walz administration is shocking.
So it is substantial.
It is heartbreaking in many ways because, as we were talking about, whether it's a program for the homeless, the one where I saw the parents for autistic children, and it is prevalent.
So I would say that Minnesota, unfortunately, because of the lack of oversight, likely has, as a percent of the dollars, one of the largest in the country.
Max with KSM Radio.
You mentioned earlier that there was offshore accounts being redistributing money.
Could you give us a list of some of those countries?
Well, I can't give a list of the countries.
I will tell you that there is a nexus around Somalia and terrorist organizations associated there.
But unfortunately, we at Treasury follow the money, and we can see that many other countries are offshore laundries.
And what we do at Treasury is we follow the money, and we are attempting to recover it for the U.S. government,
But more importantly, to break this recycling that seems to go on that leaves Minneapolis, ends up offshore, and then some of it finds its way back here.
And the last question will go to Jenny McGinnis at Star Tribune.
Hi. Just wondering if the FBI is planning any more search warrant executions ahead of the election or any other activity?
I'll leave that to the director.
uh thanks secretary and the fbi will with our partners at the department of justice execute
search warrants based on facts and law in a timely fashion upon proper adjudication by the attorney
Scott Bessent, closing general's office thank you okay well i want to thank you all for coming here today we can see
the magnitude of the problem we can see that this task force is working on a solution i was with
Vice President Vance this morning. He was unable to make it today and he and I were
going through each of the departments and I will tell you that this task force is the
most fulsome cross government agency that I have seen at my time in government. So thank
you all.

Context

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