Minnesota daycare operator charged in $4.6 million fraud scheme

A woman tied to Minnesota's Feeding Our Future scandal has been charged in a separate daycare fraud case.

Fahima Egeh Mahamud was charged Wednesday with wire fraud and conspiracy to defraud the United States, court documents show. Prosecutors say she submitted more than 13,000 fraudulent claims to the state's Child Care Assistance Program between October 2022 and December 2025, totaling about $4.6 million.

The claims were false because Mahamud certified that she had collected required co-payments from families, a condition for federal reimbursement, according to the documents.

Mahamud already faces charges in the larger Feeding Our Future case. Prosecutors allege she enrolled her Minneapolis daycare, Future Leaders Early Learning, into the federal child nutrition program and falsely claimed to serve thousands of meals.

The daycare appeared in a viral video by influencer Nick Shirley that showed empty centers and alleged widespread fraud. After the video, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services froze roughly $185 million in federal childcare funding to Minnesota.