Public statements
People disagree about responsibility for this fraud, and that disagreement is legitimate. This page does not resolve it. It sets out the record the disagreement has to start from. Every statement is dated, every claim is sourced, and every characterization belongs to the person who made it.
Statements in date order
Statements by officials who held office at the time and publicly described Feeding Our Future's lawsuit against the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE), the payment stop, or the oversight record. Where the record later spoke to a statement, the last column says what it shows. Words are quoted where the exact wording matters.
Inclusion on this page reflects a relevant public statement, not an allegation of criminal wrongdoing.
| Date | Speaker | What was said | What the record shows |
|---|---|---|---|
| April 23, 2021 (reported April 28) | Daron KorteAssistant Commissioner, Minnesota Department of Education | Two days after the April 21 hearing, he said many nonprofits reporting large numbers of meals served had created a fraud risk, and that during the pandemic the department lacked "the ability as an organization to verify all of those meal claims," per the Pioneer Press.Characterization source:St. Paul Pioneer Press | No later record addresses this statement. |
| Summer 2021 | Omar FatehState Senator (DFL) | Spoke at a gala at Safari Restaurant and, per the Pioneer Press (citing a video of the event), rallied to the charity’s cause while MDE "was attempting to put the brakes on the charity’s operations."Characterization source:St. Paul Pioneer Press | No later record addresses this statement. |
| July 29, 2021 | Daron KorteAssistant Commissioner, Minnesota Department of Education | In a deposition in the civil case, he testified he did not suspect fraud at that time, per the Senate Republican committee’s transcript of the deposition.Official retrospective report source:Minnesota Senate Republican Caucus | The record does not resolve itNo source in the record weighs these two statements against each other, so this page does not either.Characterization source:St. Paul Pioneer Press |
| January 21, 2022 | Kurt DaudtHouse Minority Leader (R) | "This is just the tip of the iceberg for fraud in federal Covid programs," demanding the governor "review every state and federal dollar being distributed by his agencies."Characterization source:CBS Minnesota | No later record addresses this statement. |
| February 2022 | Omar FatehState Senator (DFL) | After returning 11 donations totaling $11,000 tied to people named in the search warrants, he told Sahan Journal, "In 2021, I supported the USDA programs that were allegedly stolen from. Providing free nutritious meals to kids in urban food deserts is something the state is morally obligated to do. Getting rich by exploiting those same children and using them as cover is the opposite of what I stand for, what the people elected me for."Secondary source:Sahan Journal | No later record addresses this statement. |
| April 4, 2022 | Heather MuellerCommissioner of Education | Per the court’s later written statement (FOF is Feeding Our Future), in Senate testimony "the Commissioner of the Education stated that the MN Department of Education tried to stop payments to FOF, only to be ordered by Judge Guthmann to resume payments."Primary source:Minnesota Judicial BranchCharacterization source:Star Tribune | Corrected by the court in writingThe court’s September 23, 2022 written statement recounts media reports of this testimony and answers it in the court’s own words with "That is false." No order required MDE to resume payments.Primary source:Minnesota Judicial Branch |
| April 4, 2022 | Heather MuellerCommissioner of Education | In the same appearance, per the Star Tribune, she pointed to local judges as having blocked stronger action against the sponsor and called Feeding Our Future’s growth "inexplicable."Characterization source:Star Tribune | No later record addresses this statement. |
| April 4, 2022 | Roger ChamberlainState Senator (R), chair, Senate Education Committee | "This was a very large fraud, and the fact is that in other states it did not happen."Characterization source:Star Tribune | The record does not resolve itThe U.S. Department of Agriculture’s onsite-monitoring waivers were nationwide and optional, so every state operated under the same rules while making its own choices. The federal audits and national reporting reviewed for this site did not identify a comparable single-sponsor loss. The largest other-state single-sponsor case they describe is a Missouri nonprofit executive convicted of stealing $19.7 million, an order of magnitude smaller. That is a statement about those sources, not a finding about other states. The other-states section below covers them.Primary source:USDA Food and Nutrition Service |
| April 20, 2022 | Daron KorteAssistant Commissioner, Minnesota Department of Education | In legislative testimony, he said the department "had no choice" but to keep funding Feeding Our Future once it met the corrective plan, and payments resumed after the judge indicated he would likely rule against the department, per the Star Tribune.Characterization source:Star Tribune | No later record addresses this statement. |
| April 20, 2022 | Roger ChamberlainState Senator (R), chair, Senate Education Committee | At the hearings, he said "Obviously, something failed, correct?" and "Something went wrong, and we’re just simply trying to find it."Characterization source:Star Tribune | No later record addresses this statement. |
| September 8, 2022 | Roger ChamberlainState Senator (R), chair, Senate Education Committee | His committee releases its interim findings on Feeding Our Future, a Senate Republican caucus product. Because the report comes from one party, this site cites it only as a record of what people said in the testimony it transcribes, never for its conclusions.Official retrospective report source:Minnesota Senate Republican Caucus | No later record addresses this statement. |
| September 22, 2022 | Tim WalzGovernor | Said the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) had its hands tied because the department had stopped payments to Feeding Our Future but was ordered by the court to resume them, per Pioneer Press reporting of his remarks.Characterization source:St. Paul Pioneer Press | Corrected by the court in writingThe next day, the Minnesota Judicial Branch, in a statement authorized by Judge Guthmann, corrected the governor’s statements by name. It said no order ever required MDE to resume payments, and that MDE resumed them voluntarily and itself asked the court to deny the payment motion as no longer needed.Primary source:Minnesota Judicial Branch |
| September 22, 2022 | Tim WalzGovernor | Said the FBI asked the state to continue the reimbursements while its investigation continued, and that the education commissioner was under FBI direction not to say anything that could jeopardize it, per Associated Press reporting of his remarks.Secondary source:Associated Press | The record does not resolve itIn transcribed congressional interviews in early 2026 (not sworn, but told the law required truthful answers), MDE Assistant Commissioner Daron Korte answered "No" when asked whether the FBI ever told anyone at MDE to resume payments, and called lifting the stop-pay voluntary. Nutrition-programs director Emily Honer said there was no instruction from the Justice Department to continue funding. No public FBI statement confirming or denying the claim appears in the records reviewed.Primary source:U.S. House Oversight CommitteePrimary source:U.S. House Oversight Committee |
| September 23, 2022 | Tim WalzGovernor | His office said, releasing the transcript and contempt order the day after the correction, that "the court made it clear that if MDE were to continue the legal fight to withhold payments, MDE would incur sanctions and legal penalties."Characterization source:KSTP | The record does not resolve itThe court’s written correction is the authoritative record of what was ordered. It shows the June 2021 sanctions concerned site applications under the December 2020 consent order, not payments.Primary source:Minnesota Judicial BranchPrimary source:Ramsey County District Court |
| September 27, 2022 | Keith EllisonAttorney General | He told WCCO, "There was a finding of contempt in the court. The court was not pleased to [sic] MDE stopped payments. Rather than reveal everything about what we knew and show this evidence of fraud, we knew the Attorney General’s Office was not legally authorized to criminally prosecute this fraud. We knew the FBI was, so that’s where we went."Characterization source:WCCO Radio | The court record says otherwiseThe contempt finding exists, but the June 24, 2021 order concerned 144 unprocessed site applications ($35,750 sanction plus $11,750 in fees), not the payment stop. Per the court’s September 23, 2022 statement, MDE resumed payments voluntarily. His account of his office’s criminal jurisdiction matches the statutes his April 2026 letter to the House fraud committee cites, under which prosecution requires a county-attorney referral except for Medicaid fraud.Primary source:Ramsey County District CourtPrimary source:Minnesota Judicial BranchPrimary source:Minnesota Attorney General |
| April 21, 2025 | Keith EllisonAttorney General | In a Star Tribune commentary on the December 2021 constituent meeting, he wrote, "I took a meeting in good faith with people I didn’t know and some turned out to have done bad things. I did nothing for them and took nothing from them."Characterization source:Minnesota Star Tribune (commentary by Keith Ellison) | No later record addresses this statement. |
| April 20, 2026 | Keith EllisonAttorney General | In a letter to the House fraud committee, he said representing state agencies is a mandatory function of his office and that his office coordinated with the FBI during the civil case, which had asked that the investigation not be disclosed in the state lawsuit.Primary source:Minnesota Attorney GeneralCharacterization source:WCCO Radio | No later record addresses this statement. |
His 2026 statements taking responsibility are on the politics page.
People charged but not convicted are presumed innocent, and amounts labeled alleged come from charging documents, not proven losses. Method and corrections