EXCLUSIVE: ‘If taxpayers knew how bad it was, they would be outraged’: County worker offers inside look at fraud
"If taxpayers knew how bad it was, they would be outraged," the state worker said. "The system is built in a way that people learn how to stay on it forever."
A Minnesota welfare worker says the state’s public benefits system is riddled with loopholes that enable large-scale fraud and frontline staff are often afraid to question suspicious cases for fear of being labeled racist.
The worker, who requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation, has worked in public assistance eligibility for several years and currently processes healthcare cases through the MNsure and Medical Assistance systems in one of the state’s larger counties.
“There are loopholes built into these programs,” the worker told Alpha News. “And people have learned exactly how to use them.”
The worker said they came forward because they believe Minnesotans are unaware of the scale — and the structure — of the problem.
“If taxpayers knew how bad it was, they would be outraged,” they said. “The system is built in a way that people learn how to stay on it forever.”
Religious-only marriages
One of the largest loopholes, the worker said, involves religious-only marriages, which are common among East African households they work with.
Couples who are married only through religious ceremony are treated in the system as unmarried parents — even when they live together and share children, the worker explained.
“They will say, ‘Yes, we’re married — but only religiously.’ And in the system, that means they are coded as unmarried,” the worker said.
“The mother claims all the children and the father’s income is entirely excluded. So they get the benefits of a single-parent household while living together as a two-parent family.”
The worker said they have “yet to see a Somali marriage that is court-documented” in the cases they process.
“It changes everything in the eligibility calculation. The lower the income, the more generous the benefits,” they said.
Polygamy and unreported households
The worker said some East African men maintain multiple religious-only marriages, allowing them to avoid reporting a spouse for public benefits because the unions are not legally recognized.
“Absolutely,” the worker said when asked whether some Somali men have multiple wives. “Some of them, not all of them, have multiple households, multiple wives here, although it is illegal in Minnesota.”
Because the marriages are not civil, the worker said women frequently claim the father does not live in the home — even when he rotates between households.
“That is how the mother can say that the dad doesn’t live in the home, because he’s not there full time,” the worker said. “The rule is she would have to say, if he sleeps there at all, she needs to report he’s in the home. But they get by with it.”
The worker said staff are discouraged from probing deeper.
“We can never question ethnicity, we could never question the whole religious marriage thing,” the worker said. “Everybody is walking on eggshells because heaven forbid we would do a fraud referral of someone of a different ethnicity.”
Families living overseas
The worker also described cases where Somali “refugee” families regularly travel back and forth to Africa — leaving the United States for extended periods — while taxpayer-funded benefits remain active.
“They can keep their SNAP assistance open while they are over there,” the worker said. Under SNAP rules, “the money just keeps getting piled up on their cards.”
They also said the monthly capitation payments continue to be paid to their health plans on even while they are living abroad.
“These are large families — eight, 10, 12 people. The state is paying hundreds to over a thousand dollars per person per month [in health insurance].”
The worker also questioned how large families on public assistance are able to fund repeated international travel.
“How could they afford to go to Africa? I think, wow, you have no job, you’re sitting on SNAP, on healthcare, and you can afford to go to Africa every two years? Where did you get that money? It’s expensive to fly to Africa,” they said.
‘It spreads like wildfire’: Worker says autism fraud is widespread
It’s now reported that autism claims to Minnesota Medicaid skyrocketed from $3 million in 2018 to $399 million in 2023. Federal prosecutors announced charges in September against Asha Farhan Hassan for her role in a $14 million scheme to defraud a state autism program. Authorities said the charges “mark the first in the ongoing investigation into fraud” in the program.
“This has just exploded,” said the worker. “Coworkers and community members agreed in a meeting that it seems ‘every Somali household has an autistic child now.’ And that never used to be.”
The county worker claims the autism fraud pipeline is concentrated in the East African demographic: “They are their own community and they’re close knit, and when word gets out about a program, for example, this autism, it spreads like wildfire,” the worker said.
Although the East African population is relatively small in the county, the worker said they “account for a vast majority of welfare, WIC, healthcare cases in the county, and almost, I would say 70% of this autism is fraud — at least.”
The worker said one trend appears again and again: families seeking an autism label because it unlocks a “plethora of benefits.”
“They are marking their child with an autism disability when they truly do not have it, or it is very, very mild,” the worker said. “They do that because it opens up a plethora of benefits from Social Security to the State Medical Review Team (SMRT), to TEFRA, to paid parent program … The fraud is just so big.”
The worker emphasized that the problem is not the existence of disability programs, but the people exploiting them.
“I know there are adults and children with disabilities that need these services. That’s what this program was intended for, and I want everybody who needs healthcare services to receive them, especially children,” the worker said. “It is unfortunate that the programs and system are being abused by those who do not need them for the sake of money. It truly takes away from those who really need it, and burdens the entire system.”
Alpha News inquiries
A DHS spokesperson told Alpha News “only legal marriages affect Minnesota Health Care Programs eligibility determinations.”
“Minnesota Health Care Programs follow state marriage laws that require a couple: Apply for a marriage license; be married by someone authorized to perform marriages; and obtain a marriage certificate that shows they are legally married,” DHS said.
When asked whether its data show a rise in autism-related Medical Assistance billing in the county or statewide, a DHS spokesperson said, “We will not be able to provide the requested analysis by your stated deadline.”
Alpha News asked DHS about the worker’s claim that some families remain enrolled in Minnesota Health Care Programs while living overseas for extended periods. A spokesperson said that “a person who resides overseas is not eligible for Minnesota Health Care Programs,” but noted that an enrollee “may remain eligible if they are temporarily absent from the state.” Under DHS policy, the agency added, “a family that is temporarily absent from the state for more than 30 days is disenrolled from their managed care plan.”
Alpha News also reached out to the county where the worker is employed but did not receive a response.
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