by WorldTribune Staff / 247 Real News January 1, 2026

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on Wednesday said the Trump Administration is freezing federal childcare funding to all states.

The funding freeze comes amid reports that fraud involving taxpayer funded Somali-run childcare facilities goes beyond Minnesota.

Hundreds of Somali-run childcare centers in Washington state are allegedly operating without even listing a physical address, according to an Internet researcher.

Kristen Mag posted her findings on X, showing that more than 500 childcare centers which list Somali as their primary language do not include a physical street address.

HHS said the funds will be released “only when states prove they are being spent legitimately.”

HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon told ABC News that recipients of funding who are “not suspected of fraudulent activity” are required to send HHS their “administrative data” for review.

Nixon said that recipients of federal funding in Minnesota and those “suspected of fraudulent activity” have to provide HHS additional records that include “attendance records, licensing, inspection and monitoring reports, complaints and investigations.”

“It’s the onus of the state to make sure that these funds, these federal dollars, taxpayer dollars, are being used for legitimate purposes,” Nixon said.

HHS had frozen all funding to the state of Minnesota after allegations of fraudulent Somali-run day care centers there.

In a post to X on Tuesday, Deputy HHS Secretary Jim O’Neill said the agency was taking steps to address “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country” and said HHS was demanding Democrat Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz conduct a “comprehensive audit” of day care centers identified in a viral video by investigative journalist Nick Shirley.

After the video Shirley posted to social media went viral, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in an X post that her department was conducting a “massive investigation on childcare and other rampant fraud.” Similarly, FBI Director Kash Patel said the agency had already surged resources into Minnesota and that he believed alleged fraud already uncovered on federal food aid during Covid was “just the tip of a very large iceberg.”

“To date, the FBI dismantled a $250 million fraud scheme that stole federal food aid meant for vulnerable children during Covid,” Patel said in a Sunday evening X post. “The investigation exposed sham vendors, shell companies, and large-scale money laundering tied to the Feeding Our Future network.”

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  HHS freezes all child care payments: Must prove funds ‘spent legitimately’, WorldTribune.com