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By Allison Kite

Rebecca Villagracia/The Minnesota Star Tribune

Happy Friday, Dish readers!

Minnesota was the first state in the nation to draw down federal Medicaid dollars to help homeless people find housing. When the program launched in 2020, lawmakers hoped it would be life-changing for vulnerable people, my colleague Jessie Van Berkel reports. 

But bad actors quickly emerged, and last year, program billing exceeded $100 million. When it launched in 2020, the state predicted it would cost $2.6 million per year.

Now, it's the latest public program in Minnesota to be investigated for potential fraud. Locations associated with five providers in the state's Housing Stabilization Services program were searched by the FBI last week as part of an investigation into a "massive scheme" to defraud the government. 

Acting U.S. Attorney for Minnesota Joe Thompson told Van Berkel the program had limited guardrails for individuals to receive services.

“This has left the program vulnerable to bad actors and to fraud, and people billing for services that weren’t needed and were never provided," he said.

Social service providers have flagged problems with the program, including insufficient vetting and training of providers. While the state has made changes meant to tamp down on fraud, they come after years of complaints that people and taxpayer dollars have been exploited. 

Be sure to read Van Berkel's retrospective on the rise and fall — and future — of this program. 

Read more.

Mum's the word on mayoral endorsements. Some of Minnesota's high-ranking Democrats aren't saying much about who they'll endorse in the race for Minneapolis mayor, my colleagues Anna Sago and Sydney Kashiwagi report. State Sen. Omar Fateh was endorsed by the Minneapolis Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party last weekend over incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey, marking it the first endorsement by the local party in 16 years.

Gov. Tim Walz said he'd worked with Frey for years, though has yet to endorse in the race. U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar is the only member of Minnesota's congressional delegation to wade into the mayoral race so far, endorsing Frey in March.

U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar backed an anyone-but-Frey approach in 2021, but declined on Wednesday to make an endorsement or say who she'd vote for. 

Read more. 

Lindell readies a gubernatorial announcement. On the heels of his federal appeals court win, MyPillow founder Mike Lindell told Kashiwagi he's planning to announce whether he'll run for Minnesota governor sometime within the next few weeks.

"I'm very seriously considering running for governor of Minnesota, and one of the things that would be on my promises would be to try and get Minnesota to be paper ballots, hand counted, get rid of the electronic voting machines," Lindell told her.

Though he currently lives in Texas, he said he'll move back to Minnesota if he does run (Ryan Faircloth explored the residency question back in April).

Lindell, who's reportedly made millions from MyPillow, recently told a judge that his quest to prove widespread fraud in the 2020 elections has left him in financial "ruins."

What money? Asked if he would have the ability to self-fund a possible gubernatorial bid Lindell said: "What do you mean self-fund my campaign? Probably not. I spent all my money over the past four years trying to get rid of the electronic voting machines and getting attacked by media, including the Star Tribune, being one of the worst ones in the country."

Passing on a Senate run. Outside of the governor's race, Lindell said he has no interest whatsoever in a U.S. Senate bid and is backing far-right Republican Royce White in the race. "I don't want to see my state I grew up in being completely destroyed by that guy," he said of Walz and his motivation to run for governor instead of the Senate.

Kashiwagi's conversation with Lindell comes after a federal appeals court ruled that he does not have to pay a $5 million reward to a man who entered a contest Lindell put together to look for voting discrepancies in the 2020 election. 

Read more.

Walz was slated to attend the Folds of Honor ceremony at the 3M Open early this morning. His public schedule is otherwise clear the rest of the day.

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Scrutinizing Medicare Advantage. As the U.S. Department of Justice investigates UnitedHealth Group's Medicare business, Congress is examining lessons learned from and problems with Medicare Advantage, which covers most seniors in the federal health program, my colleagues Christopher Snowbeck and Christopher Vondracek report.

Last year the Office of the Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found UnitedHealth Group used questionable diagnosis data to boost payments from the Medicare program by billions of dollars. 

Read more.

Where the House Epstein drama was planned. The decision to shut down further votes in the House Rules Committee, where the drama over the Epstein files began early last week, was devised in Majority Whip Tom Emmer's office, Politico reports.

Emmer, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise huddled in the Minnesota congressman's office Monday evening to figure out how to avoid further scrutiny on Epstein.

Ultimately, they decided to not let any additional legislation move through the Rules Committee for the rest of the week. Democrats had been planning to bring up another Epstein amendment during the Monday meeting.

Fischbach's off the hook. If they hadn't canceled them, Rep. Michelle Fischbach would have likely been at the center of another contentious vote on the Epstein files, one that she's already had to take and may have to pay for heading into 2026.