Opinion | This was Minnesota Fraud Awareness and Prevention Week — could you tell?

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Another day, another fraud scheme exposed. This time, a Minneapolis “business consultant” was carted off to prison for his role in a scam that siphoned $6 million from state coffers. It joins the long and growing list of Minnesota fraud scandals: day care fraud, nonprofit fraud, wage fraud, unemployment fraud, pandemic fraud, procurement fraud. At this point, financial fraud in this state feels less like a crime and more like a recurring subscription service we didn’t sign up for.

And here’s the irony: Apparently this has been Minnesota Fraud Awareness and Prevention Week.

If you didn’t know, congratulations, you are in excellent company. Virtually no Minnesotan knows this “annual observance” exists. For a state that has spent the past several years being pummeled by one fraud scandal after another, this week should be front-page news. Instead, there has been zero coverage. Not a headline. Not a Gov. Tim Walz news conference. Not even a halfhearted social media push.

If you dig deep enough, really deep, you can find a scarcely visited state website promoting it, which proclaims “Fraud Prevention Starts with You.” If you click on the link to report fraud, it leads to another page … which leads to more clicks … and dumps you into more than a dozen different agencies and reporting forms. It’s like a bureaucratic escape room designed to make you give up.

Fraud isn’t just a crime. It’s a direct tax on every Minnesotan, and we are sick of paying it. Stolen money does not vanish into the ether. It rolls downhill onto the backs of taxpayers who did nothing wrong. Case in point: Property taxes are projected to rise by nearly $1 billion in the 2026 cycle. Meanwhile, former U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson recently warned the value of potential fraud prosecutions in Minnesota could break a billion dollars. See the connection? They steal a billion. We pay a billion.

There is the Office of the State Auditor (OSA). This link exists — if you have the time to pick through government weeds to find it. There is an online form where people can report “unlawful use of public funds or property.” The office also accepts tips by phone or email, but it offers no financial reward and no statewide publicity campaign.

Minnesota also has the False Claims Act that nods toward accountability. On paper, it allows whistleblowers to bring civil actions on behalf of the state and share in any recovered funds. That sounds promising, until you realize how narrow and inaccessible it is. The MFCA is realistically usable only by people with legal representation, deep patience and the stomach for litigation. In other words, it leaves out the vast majority of regular Minnesotans who simply see fraud, want to report it and deserve to be rewarded.

Now imagine a single, statewide fraud tip line — fully funded and properly staffed. Regular citizens often encounter warning signs long before law enforcement does and don’t know where to turn. Vendors see red flags. Contractors notice irregularities. Business partners smell rot. This would provide a mechanism to report fraud before it metastasizes. Knowing it exists, and that insiders could blow the whistle and be compensated, would serve as a clear deterrent for would-be fraudsters.

Here’s a rough sketch how Minnesota could build this:

To the governor, Legislature, state auditor and attorney general: It is time to act. Let’s turn the outrage over fraud into an opportunity. Let’s make reporting corruption easy, safe and potentially worthwhile. Let’s give Minnesotans a real tool to protect their tax dollars. The message should be clear. If you steal from the people of Minnesota, someone is watching and the state will reward those who help catch you.