Officials building Minnesota’s paid family and medical leave program set to launch Jan. 1 say they’re confident that built-in fraud prevention measures will prevent widespread abuse of the new benefit.

More than 130,000 people are expected to use the new benefit in its first year at a cost of around $1.6 billion. Around 400 state employees will administer the program.

After several high-profile schemes cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars, some state lawmakers want more scrutiny of fraud controls.

Federal prosecutors have said fraud in Minnesota government programs in recent years could exceed $1 billion, and new cases continue to emerge.

Fraud prevention measures

Minnesota’s Department of Employment and Economic Development outlined some of its fraud prevention measures for House members on Wednesday at the Fraud Prevention and State Agency Oversight Policy.

“There is no one silver bullet for program integrity. You’ve got to have a combination of people, process and technology,” said DEED Deputy Commissioner Evan Rowe. “We have a variety of overlapping controls.”

DEED will use existing data from Minnesota’s unemployment insurance program, which has a strong reputation for fraud prevention, to identify and lock accounts suspected of being compromised by hackers or impostors. A 2022 report from the nonpartisan Office of the Legislative Auditor found unemployment insurance, which DEED administers, was effective in preventing fraud.

To access benefits, applicants must submit identification and take a photo of themselves to sign up through an online platform called LoginMN, a centralized sign-in site for state services. All claims must be certified by a health care provider or other appropriate professional.

“The selfie is to prevent fraudsters who may try to use AI to scam identities,” said Minnesota Information Technology Services Deputy Commissioner Jon Eichten.

A team with access to data analytics to spot overall trends in the paid leave system will review claims. Minnesota will be the first state to integrate electronic health records into its paid leave system. The state will also conduct random audits of claims.

Cybercrime, identity theft

Rowe said his agency expects cybercrime and identity theft to be among the main forms of fraud they’ll face. But they’ll also need to ensure applicants are telling the truth on claims. Multiple points of validation will help combat dishonest applicants, he said.

Republicans on the committee zeroed in on several areas of potential fraud in the program, including verification of eligibility, monitoring intermittent leave, and the number of caregivers who can be qualified to help one person with medical needs.

“When I look at how people are going to misuse and abuse this program, it is when they say they are the caregiver … and they take off 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, 5 weeks, 6 weeks, 10 weeks, whatever it is, and they don’t actually provide care,” said Rep. Marion Rarick, R-Maple Lake.

Republican members pressed state officials for information about the upper limit for the number of people who can care for a single person. There’s technically no limit set in statute, though Rowe said there’s a review process for “complex” family situations and that there will be data to track connections between claims.

“Our program integrity unit exists to ensure that we have checks in place when there are multiple caregivers in place,” he told the committee. “We are going to be extremely careful about thinking about how those pieces can be put in place to ensure that the system is being respected … that individuals are only getting the benefits that they’re entitled to.”

‘We’ll be auditing’

Legislative Auditor Judy Randall, who heads the independent watchdog office that reviews state government programs, said she was impressed by the built-in controls in the soon-to-launch paid leave system.

“Putting the controls in place up front is by far the most effective. It’s much better than pay and chase, which is what we have found ourselves doing in some of the programs,” she said, later adding: “I’m encouraged, I’m hopeful, but we’ll be auditing.”

Minnesota paid leave will be the 13th state-run program of its kind, and is one of many new policies Democratic-Farmer-Labor leaders enacted when they controlled state government during the 2023 legislative session.

It will be funded by a new 0.88% payroll tax on most employers. It can be split between employers and employees. Employers can choose to cover the entire cost of the benefit, but most can charge employees up to about half the amount: 0.44%

Initial costs are covered by $668 million from the historic $18 billion surplus during the 2023 legislative session.

How it works

Starting next year, most employers will be required to offer employees 12 weeks of family leave and 12 weeks of medical leave. Annual time off will be capped at 20 weeks.

Events like having a child, a serious illness, or caring for a sick family member are eligible for coverage. Supporting a family member called to active duty in the military, responding to personal safety issues and bonding with a child also qualify.

The amount of money workers will qualify for under paid leave will depend on their wages.

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By JAMIE STENGLE

DALLAS (AP) — Five people pleaded guilty Wednesday to terrorism-related charges after they were accused of supporting antifa in a July shooting that wounded a police officer outside a Texas immigration detention center.

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The charges brought by the Justice Department followed President Donald Trump signing an order that designated the decentralized movement known as antifa as a domestic terrorist organization. Trump has blamed antifa for political violence.

Antifa, short for “anti-fascists,” is not a single organization but rather an umbrella term for far-left-leaning militant groups that confront or resist neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations.

FBI Director Kash Patel has previously said the charges in Texas are the first time a material support to terrorism charge has targeted antifa. A police officer was injured in the July 4 shooting near Dallas outside the Prairieland Detention Center, where federal prosecutors say an antifa cell carried out an attack that included gunfire and fireworks aimed toward the facility.

Nathan Baumann, Joy Gibson, Seth Sikes, Lynette Sharp and John Thomas each entered guilty pleas to one count of providing material support to terrorists in federal court in Fort Worth. They face up to 15 years in prison at sentencing.

Sharp’s attorney, Erin Kelley, said entering the plea was “step one in a long process” before the sentence is actually determined. Lawyers for the other four defendants either did not immediately return messages Wednesday or comment.

Cases against others also charged in the shooting remain ongoing.

According to court documents, one member of the group outside the facility yelled “get to the rifles” and then opened fire as officers responded, striking an Alvarado Police Department officer in the neck area. He fell to the ground but was able to return a few shots. Prosecutors say more rounds were then fired at the wounded officer and an unarmed DHS correction officer.

Court documents say Gibson, Baumann and Sikes were among those who were present the night of the attack and were arrested shortly after, while Sharp and Thomas were among those who helped the accused shooter avoid arrest until July 15.

Others are scheduled for arraignment in the case next month, including Zachary Evetts, whose attorney, Patrick McLain, has said he’s seen no evidence to support the government’s view of the case.

“Mr. Evetts has never been a member of anything like a ‘North Texas Antifa Cell,’ and from the evidence provided to us by the government so far, there is no evidence that such an organization ever existed,” McLain said Saturday.

The shooting took place as Trump ’s administration has ramped up deportations. Days after that shooting, a man with an assault rifle fired dozens of rounds at federal agents and a U.S. Border Patrol facility in McAllen near the Mexico border, injuring a police officer. Authorities shot and killed the attacker.

A Woodbury man was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison Wednesday for extorting teenage girls he met on social media to send him sexually explicit photos and videos.

Timothy Lennard Gebhart, 38, admitted in July to coercing two girls, ages 16 and 14, to engage in sexually explicit conduct through video chat, which he recorded. He then sent the videos and photos to other minors in an attempt to get more.

Timothy Lennard Gebhart (Courtesy of the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office)

Prosecutors said Gebhart executed the “sextortion” scheme between July 2021 and September 2023 while using aliases and posing as someone younger, including as a teenager. He extorted money and other items of value from the 16-year-old by threatening to send the videos to her family, friends and classmates.

The girls are among six victims — from Minnesota, Texas, Indiana and elsewhere — who authorities were able to identify in Gebhart’s scheme, according to prosecutors. Additional victims have not been identified.

“The scheme continued for more than two years and didn’t stop until the police stopped him,” Assistant U.S. Attorney David Classen said in his sentencing argument before Judge Jerry Blackwell in U.S. District Court in St. Paul.

Classen called Gebhart’s crimes “harmful, and cruel to the extreme.”

“These are the crimes that shatter childhoods and ruin lives,” Classen said, adding research shows victims go on to struggle with a lifetime of anxiety and fear of physical contact.

Gebhart pleaded guilty in March to all four charges in the June 2024 indictment: two counts of child pornography production, and one count each of child pornography distribution and interstate communication with the intent to extort.

The prosecution sought the 30-year term, while Gebhart’s attorney asked for a mandatory minimum 15-year sentence. Gebhart will be on intensive supervised release for 10 years following incarceration.

Intimidation, blackmail

According to court documents, Gebhart used Instagram and Snapchat to find his victims. He convinced them to send photos and videos of themselves engaged in sexually explicit conduct, sometimes in exchange for money.

Gebhart then targeted the victims’ social media contacts to find more victims to exploit, prosecutors said. He mentioned his relationships with the new victims to gain their trust.

Gebhart knew the ages of his victims because they either told him or it was apparent from their social media profiles, prosecutors said.

After receiving videos and photos, Gebhart turned to intimidation and blackmail to receive more, the indictment said. He told one victim in a November 2021 message that if she didn’t call him in one hour he would “ruin your (expletive) day. Wonder what your family will think of those pics I have of you.”

Gebhart also sent his victims “graphic and explicit videos of suicides and violent murders to coerce and intimidate the minor victims,” the indictment read.

Gebhart declined to address the court before hearing his sentence.

Reports rising

Sextortion is a growing issue, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Every day last year the organization received nearly 100 reports of financial sextortion, which involves a predator demanding money for keeping sexual images private.

Gebhart’s case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat child sexual exploitation and abuse. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, go to justice.gov/psc.

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By WILL WEISSERT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has made hardline immigration policies a signature issue, but acknowledged on Wednesday that he’s been criticized for recently saying some skilled immigrants should be allowed into the country from his “Make America Great Again” supporters.

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Trump told an audience of business executives that the U.S. needs immigrants who can train domestic workers in high-tech factories — and insisted that doing so is not inconsistent with his core political beliefs.

“I love my conservative friends. I love MAGA. But this is MAGA,” Trump said during an address to the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum, which he attended with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. “Those people are going to teach our people how to make computer chips, and in a short period of time, our people are going to be doing great. And those people can go home.”

The comments drew applause in the room. But last week, Trump sparred with Fox News host Laura Ingraham over the same issue. Ingraham suggested during an interview with Trump that “you can’t flood the country with tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, of foreign workers,” only to have the president respond, “You also do have to bring in talent.”

When Ingraham said that the U.S. had “plenty of talented people here,” Trump said, “No, you don’t,” and added that “people have to learn.”

The exchange drew swift and sharp online criticism from some corners of the MAGA movement, who have opposed expanding H-1B visas, and other programs designed to let skilled immigrants into the country.

That didn’t stop Trump from doubling down on Wednesday, adding that his detractors are “really, really smart” despite their opposition to skilled immigration. “They’re unbelievable patriots,” Trump said. “But they just don’t understand our people need to be taught.”

Trump said that when it comes to “extremely complex” domestic plants making things like computers, cell phones and missiles, it wasn’t possible to “think you can hire people off an unemployment line to run it.”

Foreign owners building the plants in the U.S. are “going to have to bring thousands of people with them, and I’m going to welcome those people,” Trump said.

As evidence, the president pointed to the case of hundreds of South Korean nationals who were detained and left the U.S. following a September immigration raid at Hyundai’s electric vehicle manufacturing site in Georgia. Some have now returned and are back at their jobs.

Trump said the workers had been ordered to “get out,” but that “I said, ‘Stop it. Don’t be stupid.’”