Watch Trump Try to Defend $1 Billion Price Tag on His “Board of Peace”
Earlier this month, the Department of Health and Human Services cut $10 billion in funding for social services such as child care and aid to poor families in five blue states – California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York – following unsubstantiated allegations that the funds were subject to fraud. Those funds were ordered to resume after a judge issued a temporary restraining order two days later.
HHS also attacked millions in federal child care credits for Minnesotans after 23-year-old right-wing YouTuber Nick Shirley alleged there was a sprawling fraud scheme taking federal funds from Minnesota-based Somali child care centers. Shirley’s report, however, was riddled with problems, largely due to the fact that the results were skewed by daycares granting her and another lone white man unannounced admission to their premises. (Looked at another way, what reputable daycare would willingly transport complete strangers to a facility full of children?)
The Trump administration, in turn, embraced the report, using it as leverage to introduce a scourge of ICE agents into Minneapolis, where their violent presence has only caused more problems, such as the murder of 37-year-old mother Renee Nicole Good. The video also fueled a new wave of racism against the city’s Somali community, which the president has used to crack down on immigration from East Africa.
