{"id":27592,"date":"2025-12-22T07:40:26","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T07:40:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/?p=27592"},"modified":"2025-12-22T07:40:26","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T07:40:26","slug":"ilhan-omar-challenger-alleges-ties-to-growing-minn-fraud-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/?p=27592","title":{"rendered":"Ilhan Omar Challenger Alleges Ties To Growing Minn. Fraud Scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Republican challenger John Nagel is accusing Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of being deeply tied to the $1 billion Feeding Our Future fraud scandal centered in her Minneapolis-based congressional district. Nagel, who is running against Omar in Minnesota\u2019s 5th Congressional District, alleged that legislation introduced by Omar helped create the conditions that allowed the fraud to occur.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhere did this actually start?\u201d Nagel said, Townhall\u00a0reported<\/a>. \u201cShe passed legislation. Her legislation actually started it, and it allowed people to get into Feeding Our Future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nagel pointed to the geographic concentration of the fraud.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at where the fraud is, it\u2019s primarily her district, the district that I\u2019m running in against her,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s really odd to think that all the fraud just happened in a particular area.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Omar introduced the Maintaining Essential Access to Lunch for Students Act, known as the MEALS Act, during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

The bill allowed states to provide free meals to children during school closures through alternative methods such as grab-and-go distribution and eased eligibility requirements.<\/p>\n

The legislation was passed by Congress with bipartisan support.<\/p>\n

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Nagel alleged that individuals within Omar\u2019s political orbit financially benefited from the fraud scheme.<\/p>\n

He said Omar held campaign events at Safari Restaurant, a business linked to the scandal, had personal familiarity with one of its now-convicted owners, and employed a staffer who was later convicted in connection with the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re going to be in politics, you need to go through the people at the Safari Land restaurant,\u201d Nagel said. \u201cThey kind of control the politics. That was her hangout. That\u2019s where she spent money and got donations.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Nagel said multiple individuals convicted in the case donated money to Omar\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cOmar says that she gave the money back,\u201d he said. \u201cPublic records show she gave some money back, but there\u2019s a whole lot more money there that she didn\u2019t report.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s just too much circumstantial evidence to look at this and say she had to have known something,\u201d Nagel added. \u201cOr at least someone on her staff knew something.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nagel criticized Omar\u2019s public response to the scandal, accusing her of deflecting scrutiny.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe made statements about how terrible it is to steal food from children,\u201d Nagel said. \u201cThat\u2019s a nice thing to say, but you have way too many people you\u2019re associated with who actually did that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Omar said last week that the fraud stemmed from weaknesses in emergency pandemic programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have these kinds of new programs that are designed to help people, you\u2019re oftentimes relying on third parties to facilitate,\u201d Omar said. \u201cA lot of the COVID programs were set up so quickly that a lot of the guardrails did not get created.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nagel said the solution is a change in leadership.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe get rid of Ilhan Omar, and we put people in Minnesota who actually want to do the right thing,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re going to have to entirely root out the Democratic Party and anyone who\u2019s been letting things slide.\u201d<\/p>\n

Omar has not been charged or accused of wrongdoing by law enforcement, and no criminal case has been brought against her in connection with the fraud investigation.<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump this month ripped Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., as \u201cgarbage\u201d and said Somalis should \u201cgo back to where they came from.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want them in our country. I\u2019ll be honest with you, OK. Somebody will say, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s not politically correct.\u2019 I don\u2019t care. I don\u2019t want them in our country. Their country is no good for a reason,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir country stinks, and we don\u2019t want them in our country,\u201d Trump said of the historically failed nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith Somalia, which is barely a country, you know, they have no, they have no anything. They just run around killing each other. There\u2019s no structure,\u201d the president added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n