Minnesota isn’t “ground zero” because of fraud alone. It’s ground zero because “Somali + fraud + terror finance” is the cleanest story to justify a pilot-scale federal takeover of money + streets.

Are we watching a playbook? Use a minority-linked “terror finance” narrative to normalize emergency-style federal powers (financial surveillance + mass enforcement) in one city first?

I’m not saying “Somalis fund al-Shabaab” as a fact. I’m saying the administration is selling that insinuation to expand power.

If the goal is “stop fraud,” focus on evidence + prosecutions, not ethnicized suspicion + blanket surveillance.

Here’s what actually happened (mechanism):Here’s what actually happened (mechanism):

• Treasury announced a Geographic Targeting Order for Hennepin + Ramsey: extra reporting on overseas transfers ≥ $3,000.

• The official order literally hard-wires the welfare frame: it requires reporting fields including whether the source of funds includes government benefit/contract program payments.

• DHS simultaneously runs a surge operation in the Twin Cities; the crackdown explicitly blurs “fraud” with immigration enforcement, with Somalis as the rhetorical target.

• The “MN taxpayer funds al-Shabaab” story gets amplified despite major evidentiary disputes in local reporting.

Why the Africa angle matters:Why the Africa angle matters:

Project 2025’s Africa section calls for recognizing Somaliland as a hedge against a weakening U.S. position in Djibouti, explicitly tying the Horn of Africa to “counterterror” and strategic competition. That’s the foreign-policy backdrop that makes “Somali remittances = terror” such a politically useful domestic story.

If officials can show charging docs + traced flows from specific fraud proceeds to designated terror entities, fine, then tighten enforcement surgically. If not, why are we normalizing an ethnicized surveillance regime?

If this is “about fraud,” why does it require a city-scale GTO + surge deployment, instead of normal audits + indictments?