As fraud scandals erupt in Minnesota on Gov. Tim Walz’s watch, accountability is in short supply

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Minneapolis
CNN
—
One state audit found that bonus checks intended for frontline workers during the pandemic were handed out to undeserving recipients. Another criticized a Minnesota state agency for failing to ensure there were no conflicts of interest in taxpayer-funded mental health and addiction programs. A third detailed lax oversight of a program to feed needy kids which federal prosecutors say resulted in the nation’s largest Covid-era fraud scheme.

But when confronted with these and other troubling examples of waste, fraud and abuse, some state agencies working under the administration of Democratic Gov. Tim Walz repeatedly minimized or dismissed the allegations, the state’s nonpartisan auditor, Judy Randall, told CNN.

A CNN review of audits – and the responses they prompted – as well as interviews with statewide politicians and pundits, found that Walz has been a hands-off leader when it comes to seeking accountability for episodes of fraud and mismanagement on his watch. What’s more, some state agencies headed by his appointees have responded defensively in recent months to the audits – a dynamic that Randall, who has worked in the department for 26 years, has found surprising.

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/10/04/politics/walz-audits-fraud-accountability-invs

Walz has presided over shocking amounts of fraud, waste and abuse as governor. Even CNN is finding very troubling patterns in MN, and pointing out that Walz is actively ignoring these problems.

Why is he considered a good leader if his performance as chief executive of MN is so bad?

Do you ever sleep because every day you come up with a new "scandal" about Harris or Walz? If you keep this up. You will be too exhausted to vote a month from today! Your writing style gives you away don't come back and sweat that this is the first time you have ever posted on DCUM!

Your daily posts remind me of VP Harris comment on the people leaving Trump rallies out of exhaustion and boredom. As for your stupefyingly idiotic and silly daily posts of "wanna be scandals" on Harris/Biden, thanks for giving us a big belly laugh.

DP. Your snotty, dismissive tone is so typical of someone who reeeeeeeally wants to sweep something under the rug. Nothing to see here, folks!

[Anonymous]

Okay, so I read this, and here is what I see. A large scale fraud from a kids fee meals program in the first months of the pandemic. That’s bad. But, it’s also when a lot of money was floating around and being pushed out as fast as possible— while Trump was POTUS, in accordance with bills Trump signed (I do notice that OP isn’t upset that Trump made the fraud possible and was ultimately responsible for the federal funds sent to Minnesota. Walz needs to have personally audited every transaction. Trump, not so much).

And to be fair, the early pandemic was about pushing money out to prevent a depression. Anyone with a brain knew there would be fraud, because that’s human nature. But, things were bad enough, that some level of fraud was deemed acceptable at the federal and state levels, because the alternative was the economy crashing. If you can find me a state with no allegations of programs or individuals using COVID money in a fraudulent manner, I’ll give you $100.

After an audit— the end result of which Walz said he agreed with— 70 people were indicted and 20 have been convicted, with many more set to stand trial. CNN is upset that the mastermind hasn’t gone to jail yet— but she was indicted and her trial starts in February. (Let’s remember here that Trump has been indicted but has yet to stand trial for alleged crimes that occurred in the same time period. Yep— you can run out the clock for a long time with legal maneuvering. Just ask the Republican presidential hopeful). Even Walz’s harshest critics clearly said he “may have been lax,” but that Walz was “not corrupt”.

But more to the point, isn’t indicting 70 people, and getting 20 convictions— with many more in the pipeline— accountability? What more do you want? Public executions in stead of jail time? Here’s what CNN doesn’t say— yes there was fraud. But the systems in place to uncover it and punish those responsible worked.

The other program they look at gave frontline essential workers bonuses totaling under $500 a person as a token of appreciation (and lets get real— 98% of the nurses who got that money would have given it back in a heartbeat not be be risking their lives on the COVID ward. Republican operatives have not actually found fraud here. They allege that the state can’t prove that everyone who got the $476 (+/- $10, I don’t remember the exact number from the article) actually worked in an essential workers role. For example, my SIL in a different state is an oncology pharmacist. But when one of the general oharmisits who was here friend *caught COVID AND DIED* she was assigned to the ER and COVID ward to cover for the dead woman. (Because oncology treatments that could be delayed were, so they had an extra pharmacist). She might have gotten a check. Or not. Depending on how entitlement was determined. And on paper, she was not really a frontline worker. In reality, she was giving IVs to people dying of COVID. $467 is about $350 after taxes. I guarantee you if she got an extra $350, she would have given up the money in a heartbeat to have her friend back, and to unsee all the dying people she was treating.

There is no allegation that anyone in the state actively diverted money, committed fraud or committed any crime. The allegation is that they didn’t do enough to make sure everyone who got $350 was assigned to an essential worker position during the relevant time period.

I mean— it’s $476 or whatever, before taxes. It’s a nice token of appreciation, not a new car. And during the pandemic when states had enormous pressure to change how they did business, protect their citizens and make huge decisions with minimal information, how much time do you want state employees to spend checking to make sure that every nurse at the hospital that got a$350 check was a true frontline worker, vs someone who was reassigned to answering phones from home because they were pregnant and high risk?

Also, this isn’t new or breaking. Republicans tried to make this a thing when Walz was re-elected in 2022. All of this was aired out, and Walz won by 9 points.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anyone who lives in the DMV is completely not shocked about DC’s corruption level. But, this is what you get with a quasi state operating under congressional mandates. I think DC statehood would help a lot here. But yeah— DC is corrupt AF. For specific reasons, many having to do with its weird governance structure. Moving past DC, it’s pretty equal mixture of red and blue states, which isn’t a shock. Especially post pandemic. I get Congress had to get money it fast, bu pt there just were adequate safeguards. And don’t “but Biden/Harris”l. A huge percentage of the money, especially to businesses, was allocated under Trump. And the lack of safeguards was a feature for his buddies, not. Bug.

You’re missing the fact Walz did not become governor until 2019, so it shows nothing about the COVID pandemic or Walz’ leadership. I guess PP couldn’t find anything more current, but this is irrelevant

Walz was sworn in a Governor on January 7,2019 and remains Governor today. Fully responsible for COVID and the protests of 2020. Math is hard and so is working of a calendar.

Trump was sworn in in 1/2017 and remained POTUS until 1/2021– for the first ten months of the pandemic. During that time, there was a huge amount of fraud related to COVID relief money. If you think Walz is bad, boy do I have news for you about your Orange Clown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who is this person/s that responds in page long paragraphs?

That person is extremely sure of themselves and thinks that if they write long screeds about their own personal experiences - which no one cares about - they’ll have some kind of gravitas that all the other anonymous posters won’t. I actually cringe with embarrassment whenever I see that poster is at it again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who is this person/s that responds in page long paragraphs?

I get it. Reading more than two short sentences is hard.

DP. Reading your irrelevant, self important word salads is painful. Please stop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who is this person/s that responds in page long paragraphs?

I get it. Reading more than two short sentences is hard.

No, you don't get it. Long Paragraphs is a clown for posting a dissertation on a mom forum.

Because Mom’s can’t read a lot of words? Seriously? Can you be any more misogynistic?

If it’s too many words for you, don’t read the post.

It's another way of saying "Sir, this is a Wendy's".

You still don't get it. I can see this is going to take a lot of explaining, probably the length of a dissertation, which I won't bother to write and post because only a complete fool would do that.

+100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Minneapolis
CNN
—
One state audit found that bonus checks intended for frontline workers during the pandemic were handed out to undeserving recipients. Another criticized a Minnesota state agency for failing to ensure there were no conflicts of interest in taxpayer-funded mental health and addiction programs. A third detailed lax oversight of a program to feed needy kids which federal prosecutors say resulted in the nation’s largest Covid-era fraud scheme.

But when confronted with these and other troubling examples of waste, fraud and abuse, some state agencies working under the administration of Democratic Gov. Tim Walz repeatedly minimized or dismissed the allegations, the state’s nonpartisan auditor, Judy Randall, told CNN.

A CNN review of audits – and the responses they prompted – as well as interviews with statewide politicians and pundits, found that Walz has been a hands-off leader when it comes to seeking accountability for episodes of fraud and mismanagement on his watch. What’s more, some state agencies headed by his appointees have responded defensively in recent months to the audits – a dynamic that Randall, who has worked in the department for 26 years, has found surprising.

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/10/04/politics/walz-audits-fraud-accountability-invs

Walz has presided over shocking amounts of fraud, waste and abuse as governor. Even CNN is finding very troubling patterns in MN, and pointing out that Walz is actively ignoring these problems.

Why is he considered a good leader if his performance as chief executive of MN is so bad?

Do you ever sleep because every day you come up with a new "scandal" about Harris or Walz? If you keep this up. You will be too exhausted to vote a month from today! Your writing style gives you away don't come back and sweat that this is the first time you have ever posted on DCUM!

Your daily posts remind me of VP Harris comment on the people leaving Trump rallies out of exhaustion and boredom. As for your stupefyingly idiotic and silly daily posts of "wanna be scandals" on Harris/Biden, thanks for giving us a big belly laugh.

DP. Your snotty, dismissive tone is so typical of someone who reeeeeeeally wants to sweep something under the rug. Nothing to see here, folks!

Nothing is being swept under the rug. This was fully aired during Walz’s 2022 re-election campaign, and the people of Minnesota decided by a large margin that it was a nothingburger.

Plus, anything you think they did, I guarantee you Trump has done it too— and in a much larger, more corrupt, more morally bankrupt and more criminal manner. And Milli Hillbilly “maybe Haitian aren’t eating coats, but I’m willing to lie if it makes people focus on how awful *legal* immigration is” and “yes I would have supported an insurrection” isn’t far behind him.

Next time, nominate people with morals and character. That might involve cleaning house annd outreach to the millions of people with decent moral character who left the GOP crime syndicate. But it would enable you at least compete for the moral high ground. Because right now, Trump and Vance are in such a deep hole they need binoculars to see Harris and Walz, who are fundamentally decent, non-corrupt people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who is this person/s that responds in page long paragraphs?

I get it. Reading more than two short sentences is hard.

DP. Reading your irrelevant, self important word salads is painful. Please stop.

IDK, it’s kind of worth it just to piss you off.

[Anonymous]

Screed writers have no self-discipline. They can’t make their point in a few sentences and instead have to resort to gibberish that no one reads.

[Anonymous]

Is this story from today? The state fair was over a month ago. Anyway, it would be a way more convincing story if it had comparisons with other governors or non-partisan people interviewed (I’m assuming that third person was relatively non-partisan, but the first two are republican politicians).