December 4, 2025 – Ilhan Omar introduced the legislation that led to Minnesota’s $250 million pandemic fraud on federal child-nutrition programs

In Email/Dossier/Govt Corruption Investigations, Featured Timeline Entries by Katie Weddington

Ilhan Oman was able to introduce the MEALS Act under the guise of the declared COVID-19 emergency by slipping it inside the larger CARES ACT. This sleight of legislative hand allowed it to move swiftly into place.

The language focused on relaxing oversight through key waivers. Waivers for things, mind you, that would have otherwise had oversight and accountability. Instead, Omar created an avenue for zero accountability that essentially paved the way for corruption.

That this was done during the Pandemic to intentionally scam our Republic during an emergency unlike any of us had ever seen before is an insult to injury if there ever was one.

Read these four bullet points, and you can see through them for what they really are. The key aspects complement one another, forming a means to create and then fund the operation.

1000% she was in on it.

Members of the inner circle of Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., personally profited from the $1 billion welfare fraud scandal in her district that has placed her Somali constituency under a White House microscope.

Omar held events at one of the restaurants named in the fraud, knew one of its now-convicted owners and had a staffer who was also convicted, the New York Post reported.

Omar also introduced the legislation that led to $250 million being defrauded from federal child-nutrition programs in COVID-19 aid, according to the newspaper.

Salim Ahmed Said

Around $250 million in state funds was distributed beginning in 2020 to provide meals to schoolchildren during the pandemic. However, the money was allegedly pocketed by Salim Ahmed Said, the co-owner of Safari Restaurant, where Omar held her 2018 congressional victory party.

Said was convicted in March for his role in the scheme, with the Justice Department stating that the funds — intended to feed children — were used to finance a lavish lifestyle.

He spent much of the money on a $2 million Minneapolis mansion and a $9,000-per-month shopping habit at Nordstrom, according to prosecutors.

The free meals were made possible by the 2020 MEALS Act, introduced by Omar and passed with bipartisan support, the Post said.

Much of the funding was funneled through the now-defunct nonprofit Feeding Our Future, according to the DOJ. Omar appeared in a video promoting the program.

(Read more: Omar allies tied to massive Minnesota COVID meal fraud scheme involving Somali community)