- In December 2025, the independent journalist and YouTuber Nick Shirley posted a video in which he claimed that daycare centers in Minnesota run by Somali Americans received millions of dollars in fraudulent payments of taxpayer money without providing actual childcare services.
- Shirley, accompanied by a Minneapolis man who had reportedly researched the alleged fraud with the help of sources within the Minnesota state Capitol, visited eight daycare centers in the video that he claimed had fraudulently received at least $27 million in taxpayer money since fiscal year 2020.
- According to ParentAware, a Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families website that hosts a childcare facility lookup tool, all of the eight daycares in Shirley’s video had active licenses and were registered with programs that use public money to help families pay for childcare.
- A spokesperson for the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) said in a statement that it had visited all of the facilities in Shirley’s video “at least once” in the six months preceding December 2025 as part of the department’s “typical licensing process.”
- The department had not confirmed Shirley’s allegations of fraud at the time of this writing, nor could Snopes independently verify the figures his report used. Snopes also could not independently verify Shirley’s claims that the daycares committing fraud were run or owned by Somali Americans.
In December 2025, the independent journalist and YouTuber Nick Shirley posted a 43-minute video (archived), titled, “I Investigated Minnesota’s Billion Dollar Fraud Scandal,” in which he claimed that daycare centers for children in Minnesota run by Somali Americans received millions of dollars in fraudulent payments of taxpayer money without providing actual childcare services.
Shirley’s video investigated both daycares and health centers he alleged received public funds without offering contracted services. Snopes readers wrote in asking whether Shirley’s claims about how much taxpayer money seemingly empty daycares had received were true. Social media users also discussed the video on Facebook (archived), Instagram (archived), Threads (archived), X (archived), Reddit (archived) and Bluesky (archived).
Shirley’s central claim was that daycare centers run by Somali Americans received money from the Minnesota Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) and other, unspecified public funding, despite not actually providing child care services, meaning looking after children on their premises. CCAP is a federal, state and county-funded benefits program that helps families cover the cost of childcare. The figures Shirley claimed were lost to fraud — up to $3.6 million for a single daycare center and more than $27 million since fiscal year 2020 — came from “David,” a Minneapolis local who had researched the alleged fraud and used figures compiled from “research done by people at the state capitol.”
Snopes could not independently verify Shirley and David’s figures, nor whether the eight daycare centers featured in Shirley’s video had fraudulently received CCAP or public funds or were run by Somali Americans.
A spokesperson for Minnesota DHS said in a written statement:
We’re aware of the video circulating online that has raised concerns about several child care centers in Minnesota. We take the concerns raised in this video very seriously. Each of the facilities mentioned in the video has been visited at least once in the last six months as part of our typical licensing process. Our staff are out in the community today to visit each of these sites again so that we can look into the concerns raised in the video.
Given the above, we have left this claim unrated.
We contacted Shirley asking to access the figures featured in his report. We also contacted a Minnesota House of Representatives employee who appeared to have emailed funding figures for two daycare centers to David related to Shirley’s investigation. We await replies to our queries.
Childcare grants allegedly key to daycare fraud
Shirley and David’s investigation alleged that one of the ways Somali American-run daycare centers defrauded the public purse was through receiving CCAP funds.
According to the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF) website, CCAP uses public money to support families with childcare costs. Families who are eligible for the benefit register their child with a participating provider that then bills the state for that child’s fees. The state decides the level of fees that CCAP will cover.
In December 2025, an expenditures forecast by the Minnesota DHS showed CCAP cost $157 million in fiscal year 2025, and that the state paid about a third of that money.
Shirley visited eight daycare centers across four zip codes in Minneapolis in his video. According to figures provided by David, those eight daycare centers had received at least $17,986,049 in government funding, including CCAP, in fiscal year 2025. Some had received funding since at least fiscal year 2020, totaling at least $27,544,654 across the eight facilities.
According to ParentAware, a Minnesota DCYF website that hosts a childcare facility lookup tool, all of the eight daycares in Shirley’s video were registered with either CCAP and/or were eligible for Early Leaning Scholarships (ELS). ELS is another publicly funded assistance program that helps families cover the cost of childcare. Families can use ELS alongside CCAP as the programs have different eligibility criteria.
Shirley and David did not break down how much of the allegedly fraudulent funding came from CCAP and how much came from other sources like ELS. Three of the daycares featured in the video were eligible for ELS but did not participate in CCAP. All appeared to have active Minnesota DHS licenses, according to the DHS license lookup website.
Investigation ran amid increased focus on Minnesota Somali Americans
Minnesota DHS had not confirmed Shirley’s allegations of fraud at the time of this writing, nor could Snopes independently verify the figures Shirley’s report used. Snopes also could not independently verify Shirley’s claims that the daycares committing fraud were run or owned by Somali Americans.
Shirley’s video circulated amid several investigations into large-scale fraud in the North Star state. Earlier in December 2025, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson told a news conference that half or more of $18 billion in federal funds that supported 14 Minnesota-run Medicare and Medicaid programs since 2018 may have been stolen through fraud. Some 82 of the 92 defendants charged in the case were Somali Americans, according to The Associated Press.
Meanwhile, prosecutors charged dozens of defendants in the Feeding our Future scheme, which the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Minnesota called “the largest Covid-19 fraud scheme in the country,” estimating that fraudsters stole $300 million in public funds by claiming to provide meals to children. Local news media reported that “most of” the defendants in that case were also of Somali descent.
U.S. President Donald Trump has also made pointed comments about Somali Americans in Minnesota, calling immigrants from the African country “garbage” and saying he wanted them sent “back to where they came from.”
Sources
’78th Defendant Charged in Feeding Our Future Fraud Scheme’. U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Minnesota, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Minnesota, 24 Nov. 2025, https://www.justice.gov/usao-mn/pr/78th-defendant-charged-feeding-our-future-fraud-scheme.
Brown, Kyle. ‘Feeding Our Future Defendants Seek to Move 2026 Fraud Trial out of Minnesota’. KSTP.Com 5 Eyewitness News, 23 Dec. 2025, https://kstp.com/kstp-news/top-news/feeding-our-future-defendants-seek-to-move-2026-fraud-trial-out-of-minnesota/.
‘Child Care Assistance Program Information for Child Care Providers’. Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families, https://dcyf.mn.gov/child-care-assistance-program-information-child-care-providers.
‘Families’. Parent Aware, https://www.parentaware.org/families/. Accessed 30 Dec. 2025.
‘Feeding Our Future Defendant Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison’. U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Minnesota, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Minnesota, 24 Nov. 2025, https://www.justice.gov/usao-mn/pr/feeding-our-future-defendant-sentenced-10-years-prison?bm-verify=AAQAAAAM_____4Z66DNAHc9AQ_vQkLobeRXrZR6FCiwM11pPH9c_Xmp18DW05PNl1sFQAiYMc4Fhn3L3FAsnQzv0IYOvN9z3O2bYVnR3HEn9aVUZYxJwIJH6aW3Aqx1M34S3TLUXEM1lgffdMi-MWo6ZZL1qIuH4kD5tmT1wEWp6F2xbmyHev9qmDRYdZcHRy5p5N_7xDsFNRGjkUtusH1lvw8p8C2H6n0d1etoHYt0I_YeGWbz7Q06s9Aj8y6fGzi55aTodL5rOxnO4qqVS7fkOUY5bIdxBl21wFi5hLwa6o4s8j1PuXp8HLMwWASeWGSft-505F9SQ7OyM9DnLvnLxE9X7ukOPmTvjt2StStNqHbhfyn_FpWsrSRBx.
FINGERHUT, HANNAH. ‘Key Questions about Minnesota’s Fraud Schemes and the Billions in Losses’. AP News, 19 Dec. 2025, https://apnews.com/article/minnesota-fraud-feeding-our-future-medicaid-9911799c0d0149a64a042abed095be57.
Flowers, Bianca, et al. ‘Trump “garbage” Rhetoric about Somalis Draws Cheers from Administration, Silence from Republicans and Alarm from Critics’. Reuters, 4 Dec. 2025, https://archive.ph/cPLyo#selection-1093.0-1093.15.
FOX 9 Minneapolis-St. Paul. ‘LIVE | Fraud in Minnesota Announcement from U.S. Attorney’. YouTube, 18 Dec. 2025, https://www.youtube.com/live/NirLDCHIpr0?t=3346s.
Minnesota Department of Human Services – Child Care Assistance Program . ‘RE: Early Learning Scholarships and the Child Care Assistance Program’. Memo. 31 Jan. 2024, https://www.dhs.state.mn.us/main/groups/county_access/documents/pub/mndhs-065497.pdf.
MN HOUSE RESEARCH. ‘The Child Care Assistance Program’. Dec. 2024, https://www.house.mn.gov/hrd/pubs/pap_ccap.pdf.
‘November 2025 Forecast’. Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families, 4 Dec. 2025, https://dcyf.mn.gov/sites/default/files/2025-12/DCYF-November-2025-Forecast.pdf.
Shirley, Nick. ‘I Investigated Minnesota’s Billion Dollar Fraud Scandal’. YouTube, 26 Dec. 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8AulCA1aOQ.
