Who Opened the Door.

Since fraud is going to be a major issue this election, it's time I put my thoughts on record.

If you only read headlines, it's easy to pick a side to blame. But when you actually dig into the history, there's plenty of blame to go around.

This particular issue, the Early Intensive Developmental and Behavioral Intervention program’s oversight fix, started in 2016. DFL senators authored SF 2751, which reworked Minnesota's autism benefit and included many of the oversight provisions people are demanding now. Republican Rep. Kathy Lohmer carried the House companion. Bipartisan from the start. Neither bill moved.

In 2017, with Republicans controlling both chambers, they expanded EIDBI without a single no vote -- 66 to zero in the Senate, 131 to zero in the House. Then the Senate's health budget, SF 800, cut DHS funding deep enough that Governor Dayton vetoed it. In his veto letter he said the bill would represent "a cut of $19.7 million and would impact an additional 87 positions, including staff who are responsible for investigating allegations of fraud and abuse." Fraud investigators. Gone.

That same year, the Republican-controlled legislature ended Minnesota's 40-year ban on for-profit corporations holding HMO licenses. That's when the state started losing its ability to follow the money. When programs ran through DHS directly, the state could see every claim. Once managed care took over, that visibility disappeared. As of March 2026, HMOs control roughly 75% of EIDBI funding. The state can only directly track about 25%.

That's how we got here.

Fraud is not a party platform. People who committed fraud should be held accountable. So should the people who cut the watchdogs and opened the door. The same guardrails Republicans are demanding now are the ones they took away before COVID. And yes, the DFL should have pushed harder to restore them once they were gone.

Neither side is clean. But the record is clear about who made the fraud easier to commit.