House education panel subpoenas Tim Walz over Minnesota fraud case

WASHINGTON (CN) — The House Committee on Education and the Workforce issued a congressional subpoena to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz on Wednesday, suggesting that he failed to properly address a fraudulent nonprofit organization in his state accused of stealing millions of dollars from federal nutrition programs.

The Republican-led panel has been investigating the fraud case involving Minnesota-based nonprofit Feeding Our Future since June, and has framed its subpoena as a last resort. But Democrats have accused GOP lawmakers of abusing their congressional oversight powers to investigate Walz, the Democratic nominee for vice president.

At the center of the education committee’s probe are 2022 fraud charges brought by the Justice Department against employees of Feeding Our Future. U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger said at the time that the nonprofit group had defrauded the Minnesota government’s Agriculture Department-funded school nutrition programs of around $250 million.

In a letter to Walz accompanying Wednesday’s subpoena, North Carolina Representative Virginia Foxx, the education committee’s chair, said she was demanding documents related to the Minnesota Department of Education’s administration of federal child nutrition programs and its oversight of Feeding Our Future.

As governor of Minnesota, Walz is responsible for the state’s education department and its management of federal school nutrition programs, she pointed out, going so far as to contend that the vice presidential candidate was aware of the nonprofit’s fraud.

“Statements in the press by you and your representatives indicate that you and other executive officers were involved, or had knowledge of, MDE’s administration of the [nutrition programs] and responsibilities and actions regarding the massive fraud,” Foxx wrote.

The committee chair pointed to comments Walz made to the Minnesota Star Tribune in June, in which he argued that there “wasn’t malfeasance” in the state’s education department and that no state employees were implicated in any illegal activity.

The Justice Department in 2022 levied charges against 47 people, all employees of Feeding Our Future.

Despite Walz’s contention that Minnesota officials were not involved in the fraud scheme, Republicans said they were determined to find out how much the governor knew about the efforts to defraud federal child nutrition programs.

“Time for answers,” Foxx wrote Wednesday on X. Walz has until noon on Sept. 18, or around two weeks, to respond to the subpoena.

Democrats, meanwhile, accused their Republican colleagues of playing a cynical political game, using congressional oversight to go after a member of the opposing presidential ticket.

“Blatant use of official resources for a campaign,” said Florida Representative Max Frost. “Pretty disgusting!”

It’s not the first time that House Republicans have taken aim at Walz in the weeks since he was announced as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate. The House Oversight Committee has opened a probe seeking to tie the Minnesota governor to the Chinese government.

In an Aug. 16 letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray, Kentucky Representative James Comer expressed concern about student trips to China organized by Walz while he was a teacher and called attention to a private company the governor founded in the 1990s to facilitate those trips.

Comer also pointed to statements from Walz that he framed as overly friendly to Beijing and suggested, with no evidence, that the VP candidate was a target of “elite capture” from the Chinese government, contending that he had been co-opted to benefit China’s interests.

The new scrutiny on Harris and Walz comes amid House Republicans’ ongoing investigation into President Biden, who they have accused, also with little solid evidence, of misusing political influence to score lucrative business deals for his family, among other things.  

Biden announced in July that he would no longer seek reelection, and Harris formally accepted the Democratic mantle last month.

Follow @BenjaminSWeiss

Subscribe to Closing Arguments

Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.

Email *

Submit