Ilhan Omar Says Fraud Scheme Hurt Somalis in Minnesota, Too [WATCH]

A billion-dollar fraud, 87 defendants, and Omar insisting Somalis were victims too — Minnesota’s scandal just keeps getting hotter.

Ilhan Omar sparked fresh outrage Sunday after appearing to suggest on CBS News that the real victims of Minnesota’s massive COVID relief fraud scheme — a scandal in which nine out of ten people charged were Somali — were other Somalis.

On Face the Nation, Omar told host Margaret Brennan it is “frustrating” that people don’t recognize the Somali community is “upset” about the scheme, which reportedly funneled taxpayer money into the hands of a Somali radical Islamic terrorist group. House Oversight Chairman James Comer has said the perpetrators “stole nearly $1 billion” from a nonprofit that claimed to feed hungry schoolchildren.

Brennan laid out the scale of the scandal bluntly: “The Biden-era Justice Department called it the largest COVID fraud scheme in the country, and this was pocketing COVID-era welfare funds, more than a billion dollars in taxpayer money that was stolen. Of the 87 people charged, all but eight are of Somali descent… Why do you think this fraud was allowed to get so widespread?”

Omar’s response raised eyebrows: “I want to say, you know, this also has an impact on Somalis, because we are also taxpayers in Minnesota. We also could have benefited from the program and the money that was stolen. And so it’s been really frustrating for people to not acknowledge the fact that we’re also — as Minnesotans, as taxpayers — really upset and angry about the fraud that has occurred.”

Later, Brennan pointed out that Feeding Our Future — the group at the center of the scheme — initially claimed the investigation was motivated by racism. “Do you think that this was all about negligence, or that it was, like, political fear of alienating the Somali community?”

Omar fired back by shifting blame to the nonprofit’s own leadership: “So you have to remember that the woman who led the program is a Caucasian woman, and that was her way of making sure that this would continue to happen by using whatever rhetoric that was available to her,” she said, referring to founder Aimee Bock.

Watch the clip below:

Rep. @Ilhan Omar says the COVID-era welfare fraud in Minnesota, which amounts to more than $1 billion in taxpayer money, has harmed the Somali community who could have benefited from the program.

“We are taxpayers in Minnesota. We also could have benefited from the program and… pic.twitter.com/Qm0Bs4SkML

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) December 7, 2025

Omar also questioned whether or not the funds were really going to terrorism, as initially reported; she says she’s “pretty confident at the moment” that the claim isn’t valid.

Watch the clip below:

Rep. @Ilhan Omar says she is “pretty confident at the moment” that claims linking Minnesota’s COVID-era welfare fraud to terrorism are false. She says that those prosecuted “have been sentenced” and that if stolen money were going to terrorism that “is a failure of the FBI and… pic.twitter.com/bN8ieczFSV

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) December 7, 2025