A month after the Trump administration began its immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis, right-wing creators are turning their attention to a new target in search of fraud: California.
Over the last few weeks, right-wing creators who were instrumental in boosting the Minnesota fraud allegations that predated the administration’s surge of federal immigration agents have been going after a number of California’s social welfare programs, making unsubstantiated accusations of fraud—and potentially laying the groundwork for a similar federal crackdown in the nation’s largest Democrat-run state. They’re already getting support from some of President Donald Trump’s key allies too.
Nick Shirley, the right-wing influencer whose viral YouTube video claimed to uncover a purported $100 million fraud scheme involving Somali childcare centers in Minnesota, posted to Instagram over the weekend announcing his arrival in California. “Secrets out,” Shirley wrote in an Instagram story set to Katy Perry’s “California Gurls.” It’s unclear what exactly Shirley plans to do, but he claims to be “investigating” Somali-run childcare centers in California as well, according to posts that circulated on X over the weekend.
Shirley is working with Amy Reichert, a private investigator and failed politician who claims to be investigating “ghost daycares” in California. In his Minnesota video, Shirley “investigated” the fraud by showing up to daycares asking to see children. He appears to be applying the same method in San Diego. Reichert posted a picture with Shirley to X on Saturday, writing “California, here we come! When @nickshirlye drops the video, it’s going to be 🔥.” (Local Minnesota outlets published multiple stories covering childcare fraud years before Shirley’s video came out.)
On Sunday, Benny Johnson, a pro-Trump creator and Turning Point USA contributor, published his own “documentary,” in a similar vein to what Shirley filmed in Minnesota. In it, he claimed to reveal a multimillion-dollar “homeless industrial complex” in California. Johnson teamed up with two Republican gubernatorial candidates, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco and Steve Hilton, a former adviser to UK prime minister David Cameron, in the video, which they claimed was an attempt to uncover fraudulent uses of federal funding to support California’s unhoused. Johnson also claimed that the state was “using these federal dollars to rig national elections.”
California governor Gavin Newsom’s office rejected the claims Johnson made in an X post on Sunday, calling the video “literally the conspiracy theory meme in real life.”
Johnson’s most recent video attempts to claim that California’s homeless shelters are primarily filled with undocumented immigrants. His main piece of evidence is a phone call with a purported “whistleblower” whose identity was concealed. (Newsom’s office responded to this claim, calling it “as real as our Free Unicorn for all undocumented people program.”)
The same week Johnson announced that he would be traveling to California to uncover “fraud,” Trump called California “more corrupt” than Minnesota in a post on Truth Social. “Fraud Investigation of California has begun,” Trump wrote. Last week, Trump named a new assistant attorney general, Colin McDonald, to focus on fraud investigations at the Justice Department.
Other large pro-Trump accounts and news outlets, like Real America’s Voice, are boosting Johnson’s recent video. Larry Elder, talk radio host and former presidential candidate, reposted the video on X on Tuesday, writing “Fraud in California makes that of Minnesota look like a starter kit.”
Elon Musk, who Shirley thanked for initially boosting his December Minnesota video, has also been elevating news coverage related to California fraud. “Truly insane levels of fraud!” Musk said, reposting a story from Fox News earlier this week.
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) administrator Mehmet Oz published his own documentary-style video on alleged health care fraud in California last week, featuring an Armenian neighborhood. Oz, whose parents emigrated from Turkey, likened the fraud to being run “by the Russian Armenian mafia.” Newsom’s office filed a civil rights complaint against Oz shortly after the video was published for “baseless and racially charged allegations.” Last month, Oz said that CMS would withhold around $300 million in funding from California and claimed it was because the state was using the funds on “non-emergency health care for illegals.”
In January, WIRED reported that California and New York were “next,” as the Trump administration appeared ready to leverage the same playbook used in Minnesota to go after other blue states.
“POTUS loves Minnesota and the people. It’s a state where he received historic Republican support, and he has long called out [Governor Tim] Walz for his incompetence and terrible leadership,” a senior White House official told WIRED last month. “The fraud is so blatant and widespread that it’s a good place to start, but it’s only the beginning. CA and NY next.”
Asked about ICE’s role in fraud investigations last month, the senior White House officials said that “if the fraudsters are illegals, they are getting deported.”
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