Maine Wire Monday's

Well, I don't think so. You know, I would imagine I would compare it to if you're driving somewhere and you're using Apple directions and Apple pops up and says, hey, speed trap up ahead. So it would be kind of the same kind of behavior except for I think that the consequences of the Apple speed trap alerts are you just slow down. And so it makes the interstate safer, whereas the consequences of alerting illegal alien criminals that the presence of the presence of ICE is that they tend to hide within the community and thereby increase the chances of a violent encounter between immigration authorities and, you know, members of the community. But it's just a clear, you know, ideological stance that the newspaper is taking. I'm sure that whatever group is. running these advertisements. I don't think that they're paying the, you know, the same rate that the car dealerships or the furniture companies are paying for that ad space. Honestly, I don't even know if you even have to pay for ad space in that paper anymore. There's such a small audience for it, but they're probably giving it away for free as part of their ideological mission because it's clear that that paper has taken. an editorial stance on the side of illegal aliens and against law-abiding citizens. Steve Robinson joining us, editor-in-chief of the main wire, and he is talking to us on Monday, as he always does, turning our attention to a somewhat related story, actually. I wanted to ask you to help me navigate through... What the president of the United States is kind of hinting at and outright saying about temporary protected status for Somalis. So to kind of back up here, a lot of this sort of traces from the shooting of the National Guard troops. In the wake of that, he started getting on a thing about looking about a lot of the people who are here on a green card, temporary protected status for a lot of groups. But he started to zero in on Somalis specifically and actually Minnesota specifically because, in his words, they're taking over that state. a large population. Obviously, this is a little tied into their mayoral race that just happened. They had a candidate that was very prominent there, obviously. But threatening now to remove that temporary protected status for Somalis would have fairly significant consequences for Maine, depending on how it's done and who it applies to, if it's for everybody, obviously, or if it's just Minnesota or whatever. Can you kind of walk me through what the hell he's talking about? What might actually happen and what it might mean for Maine? Yeah, so the story really begins with an article by Chris Rufo in the City Journal, which detailed some of the, I guess, the Medicaid fraud and the other benefits fraud that was being pulled by Somali-run NGOs out in Minnesota. The Feeding Our Future scandal is now, I think, is like a half a billion or a billion dollars that was embezzled by Somalis and Somali-run NGOs. And what Rufo's investigation found was that at least some of that money was being funneled back to Somalia through the Hawala networks, which are, it's basically like, you know, PayPal or cash app, but informal networks that don't go over the internet. There are ways of transferring money between countries that are not susceptible to government surveillance. And at least some of this Hawala money was being skimmed.

by terrorist groups like al-Shabaab. So the headline message was Medicaid money, taxpayer dollars, money for coronavirus programs, was ending up in Somalia funding al-Shabaab military campaigns. And we're talking about billions of dollars. And the list of people who have already been indicted for the feeding our future scandal, it's like 75 people. You've seen the entire Department of Health and Human Services out there. has taken over the social media feeds of the state of Minnesota and said, this is all on Governor Tim Walz. He's turned a blind eye to this. He's protected the fraud. He's recriminated against people who have tried to blow the whistle on this. This is, you know, really a Walls administration-wide scandal that has resulted in these Somali clans just pilfering money from taxpayers. So that happened. And then the National Guard shooting happened. And the president put out a truth social post saying that he was going to end temporary protected status for Somalis in Minnesota. My sources in Washington say that the end of temporary protected status will not just apply to Somalis in Minnesota. It will be nationwide. So it will apply to Somalis in Maine. And what the end of temporary protected status means. is that Somalis are once again eligible for deportation. Since about 1991 or 1993, they've had this TPS designation, which means that their home country is so unstable or so unsafe that they are not eligible for deportation or return to their home country. That will no longer be the case. So Somalis who have committed crimes, who do not have, you know, a permanent lawful status here in the United States. If they've committed a crime, if they're apprehended by ICE, they will be deported back to Somalia. And the president is also talking about denaturalization. And so that would put into play an even larger class of Somali non-citizens who have, you know, come here, obtained green cards. And even naturalized U.S. citizens like Ilhan Omar, she could theoretically be denaturalized and deported back to Somalia as the president has threatened to do. So I think the big picture is that you're seeing between the stories coming out of Minnesota and the shooting of two national guardsmen, the president is becoming increasingly radicalized on the issue of... deporting migrants to this country who appear to be involved in elaborate schemes to take advantage of benefit programs. And I would be remiss if I didn't sort of drag this to Maine in another direction too. I know you and I have had conversations about sort of nonprofit fraud here and the list of no bid contracts and all the things that... very, to me, are reminiscent of the Minnesota experience with all that sort of grift that's taking place there. That's happening here as well. And some of it is tied to, frankly, the same community.

It absolutely is. I mean, you look at Gateway Community Services. This is, in some ways, this is an NGO that wrote the playbook that is unfolding in Minnesota where you form an NGO or an LLC and you provide migrant services and you submit bills to Medicaid or Maine Care or Minnesota Care, whatever they call it out there. And those bills may be backed up by actual services or they may just be complete fiction. Either way, the taxpayer pays for them. And if there's an audit and you have the right political connections, you're never going to have to pay that money back. And this is a scheme that we've seen replicated over and over again, both in Maine and in a large degree in Minnesota. And I'll say that, you know, the main wire has. our hands on the full list of Medicaid payments from 2019 to 2024. And there's much, much more to come on this front because Medicaid and the related programs of the no-bid contracts have been absolutely robbing Maynors blind. Year after year, it's the largest expense category. And I think if people knew the full amount of money that was being sucked out of Maynors' pockets, to go toward these phony NGOs, they would be irate. Yeah, and they should be. Steve Robinson, unfortunately, out of time. As always, we run out of it on Mondays, and we appreciate being with us. Make sure you check out the main wire and the Robinson Report online every week. Appreciate it, Steve, and we'll talk to again next Monday.