The Office of the Legislative Auditor (OLA) announced a new bout of fraud in our state agencies yesterday (Tuesday). The OLA report confirms what many of us have been saying - Gov. Walz and democrats failed to responsibly manage hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in mental health and substance abuse grants. The audit found that DHS's Behavioral Health Administration did not comply with most grant requirements and lacked basic internal controls to ensure taxpayer dollars were being spent properly. The OLA uncovered evidence that DHS staff created and backdated documents after the audit began to try to cover their tracks. This is completely unacceptable. Forging fake documents to give to an auditor would result in stiff penalties in the private sector. The same stiff penalties should also occur in government. The Legislative Auditor Judy Randall cited systemic failures, not isolated mistakes, pointing to a culture where oversight was ignored and accountability was nonexistent.

The OLA report revealed the scope of fraud on this one program:

Between July 1, 2022, and December 31, 2024, DHS distributed more than $425 million in grants to 830 grantees, 590 of them nongovernmental organizations.
Missing or past-due progress reports for 27 of 51 grant agreements.
BHA could not demonstrate that it completed 27 of 67 required monitoring visits.

For 24 visits involving 11 grantees, BHA could provide no documentation.
For three visits to one grantee, documentation was created in February 2025, after the audit began, despite the visits supposedly occurring in May 2024, October 2024, and January 2025.

Incomplete financial reconciliations for 63 of 71 grant agreements.
A grant manager approved $672,647.78 in payments and later left BHA to work for the grantee.
An internal employee survey showed deep concerns within BHA:

73% of respondents said they did not receive sufficient training to manage grants.
Survey response from BHA employee: “Executive leadership has repetitively shown staff that they won’t take the staff’s concerns or questions seriously until something serious happens or it makes the news.”

These types of actions from our state agencies are deeply disturbing. Not only was there fraud to begin with, employees of the state attempted to hide their fraud from auditors. This culture of misuse and fraud needs to change and we need more controls in place.

I’m among the Republicans who have been fighting for years for more oversight on state funds but have been hampered by the Democrat majority. Without proper oversight, the true magnitude of fraud is unknown. Every week there’s a new headline coming out of Minnesota about more fraud. This is what happens when government grows too large, too unaccountable, and too insulated from consequences. From Gov. Walz, to DHS leadership, to agency managers, failure was allowed to pile onto failure, while taxpayers paid the bill.

With the 2026 legislative session beginning in approximately six weeks, I will continue pushing for accountability.

Minnesota Legislators Speak to Congressional Oversight Committee

Earlier today a group of three Minnesota House Members spoke to a congressional oversight committee about fraud in Minnesota. State Representatives Walter Hudson, Marion Rarick, and Kristin Robbins are in Washington DC testifying in Congress. The hearing was a continued step in getting more national attention on the Democrat fraud issue, and hopefully more federal support investigating this fraud to hold people criminally accountable. Video of this hearing can be found here.

More Fraud in DHS

Minnesota Legislators Speak to Congressional Oversight Committee

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