Minnesota’s Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) paid more than $67 million in public childcare subsidies over the past eight years to nine day care providers, several of which were confirmed to have been raided by federal authorities last week.
The figure is based on an investigation of state records by local Minnesota news outlet KSTP, which points out that since there have not been any charges, it is unclear how much of this may be fraud. While an exhaustive list of the daycares raided last week has not been released by authorities, public records can confirm several included programs that receive CCAP subsidies.
The investigation of state records found that in the final two years of publicly available data that state payments through the CCAP program to these nine centers more than doubled, growing from around $8 million in 2023 to over $16 million in 2025, while the number of students served remained steady.
“I think voters are very frustrated with the entire situation. I don’t think it’s Republican or Democrat — they’re just frustrated,” former state lawmaker, a small business owner and member of the Taxpayer League of Minnesota, Phil Krinkie, told KSTP.
“Just last week, Democrats killed a bill to increase oversight and fraud penalties for child care providers receiving high amounts of CCAP funding, like these nine providers,” the Minnesota House Republican Caucus added on X.
Federal agents issued 22 search warrants at day care and autism centers in Minnesota last week.
Fox News Digital reached out to the FBI, Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota, and the Department of Health and Human Service’s Association of Children and Families (ACF) to confirm details of the raids, including whether the nine daycares receiving CCAP funds were part of last week’s operations. Only HHS responded, indicating that “ACF does not comment on ongoing litigation.”
Former Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson said the scope of the warrants suggests investigators are looking for evidence that publicly-funded services were actually provided, according to KSTP.
“Whether it’s a business, a school, a nonprofit — if something grows that much, you know, makes sense to ask why is it growing that much and how could it grow so fast,” Swanson, who oversaw several Medicaid fraud prosecutions during her time as Attorney General, told KSTP.
“These are federally and state-funded programs,” Swanson continued. “The question is, ‘were services billed to the government that weren’t rendered?'”
CCAP is a publicly funded program for families who cannot afford childcare administered via Minnesota’s Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF), which also provided the data examined by KSTP. Fox News Digital reached out to DCYF for comment and details about the CCAP program but did not hear back in time for publication.
DCYF did not give any information to KSTP, either. The local Minnesota news operation had to go to state Rep. Kristin Robbins, chair of the House Fraud Prevention and State Agency Oversight Committee in the Minnesota legislature, after the agency ignored its public records request.
Robbins made the same request, but DCYF did provide the records, documents and data in that case, according to KSTP.
