Trump’s Anti-Fraud ‘Whistleblower Program’ Is a Hypocritical Excuse for Vigilante Justice

Screenshot

The Trump Administration has a new plan to elevate their midterm message about “government fraud”: a $25 million “Whistleblower Incentive Program”:

Through the program, journalists and “average Americans” can submit tips, and if that tip leads to a successful conviction for fraud or enforcement actions, that individual is eligible to receive up to $30k.

To kick off the stunt, President Donald Trump has presented conservative influencer Nick Shirley with a check for $10,000 for his “efforts to uncover fraud in Minnesota.”

Like a lot of the Trump administration’s initiatives, the policy is simultaneously difficult to take seriously and terrifying. The tallest hurdle to seriousness is the six-foot-something tax cheat who handed Shirley the check.

But the plan is also ridiculous because it shows yet again that Trump has no understanding of how government actually works. A whistleblower program is not a matter of sticking an intern a room with rotary phone, and fraud cases are generally complex beasts–they are not typically brought to light with the kind of iPhone-and-an-X-account theatrics of Nick Shirley. In fact, the “fraud” Shirley documented fell apart under the scrutiny of real journalists.

The irony of Shirley’s misadventure is that even as he was shoving his phone in Somali residents’ faces, a massive government embezzlement case based in Minnesota was already unfurling, the result of an investigation started under the Biden administration. The mastermind of that fraud operation was a White woman, Aimee Bock, who has since been sentenced to 500 months in prison. The FBI swept up Somali perpetrators as well; their involvement serves Trump’s narrative purposes while Bock’s crimes do not.

See, Trump and Stephen Miller and the rest of the goon squad are not actually interested in preventing and prosecuting fraud.

MAGA politicians who bang the drum of fraud are after two things. First, to gas up a Republican rhetorical staple since Reagan railed against “Welfare Queens:” Bigots’ suspicion that Black and brown people are less deserving — that they are hustling the system. The second objective is to send a message that’s even more corrosive to democracy: You, the Trump-supporting “average American” can do something about these con artists beyond just voting for the “tough-on-crime” candidates. This program turns self-identified patriots into mercenaries.

In the context of Trump’s racialized, sweeping accusations, this program puts a bounty on the heads of the people he points to as guilty–and we all know what color they will be. What’s more, we all know what level of due process the targets will receive. I do think it’s more likely that targets see a jail cell than snitches see dollar signs.

Still, the money is somewhat irrelevant (to the relief of the administration, I’m sure). What matter is the permission structure the money represents. I mean, Trump rally attendees are happy to punch a defenseless woman in the face for free.

These strong-arm tactics have backfired. Prior to Trump’s invasion and occupation of the Twin Cities, the Biden Justice Department investigation weighed heavily on Minnesota’s Democratic state leadership. Gov. Tim Walz abandoned his re-election campaign over the scandal. Then, citing Shirley’s “investigation,” DHS launched Operation Metro Surge. 

DHS’s first arrests in Minneapolis were not of the Hispanic immigrants later associated with the crackdown. The department arrested people from the Somali community who Trump robbed of protected status en masse after learning of the fraud arrests of a few. The operation expanded, cruelly. Two citizens murdered in the streets, whole families disappeared. Trump’s determination to use the supposed criminality of minorities as a justification for violence pushed stories about real fraud entirely off the radar. Instead, it radicalized wine moms in Edina into resistance cells.

——

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!