Abdi Daisane’s victory in Minnesota House District 14A has quickly become a political lightning rod. The DFL candidate defeated a Republican incumbent Tuesday night, winning the St. Cloud seat while questions about his daycare business, public funding and online claims involving his family spread across social media.
MPR News reported that Daisane became the first Somali-born lawmaker from St. Cloud to serve in the Minnesota statehouse. During his victory speech, he delivered part of his remarks in Somali. That would normally be the headline. Instead, the funding trail attached to his childcare center has made the election considerably more complicated.
Daisane is the CEO of Blooming Kids Child Care Center in St. Cloud. The center has received $7.29 million from Minnesota’s state-run Child Care Assistance Program since 2018. It also received $598,251.62 from the federally funded Child and Adult Care Food Program since 2020.
Blooming Kids received those CACFP funds through Partners in Nutrition, a nonprofit that recently paid an $18.5 million civil settlement over fraud allegations. A press release about that settlement said Partners in Nutrition “knowingly defrauded the State of Minnesota out of millions of dollars in federal child nutrition funds during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, in violation of the Minnesota False Claims Act.”
When millions in taxpayer-backed funding are involved, asking questions is not exactly a radical activity. It is the bare minimum, especially when a nonprofit connected to the funding has reached such a costly settlement.
Fox News Digital visited Blooming Kids on Thursday and described a quiet scene. The center sits along a main road in downtown St. Cloud. A paper sign on the wooden front door directed visitors to another entrance, while floor-to-ceiling windows were covered with tinted, mirrored film. The parking lot was mostly empty, and a small fenced playground behind the building contained two jungle gyms that appeared to take up most of the available space.
Alpha News reported on the funding in late October and spoke with a nearby worker who said they had never seen children entering or leaving the facility. The outlet also reported that Blooming Kids had been cited for more than a dozen violations. Daisane did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Questions about Daisane’s wife, Ayaan Aydid, also circulated online after a video surfaced showing her describing to the BBC how she crossed into the United States at the southern border. ACT for America founder Bridgette Gabriel later flagged a post about Daisane’s election and his purported illegal immigrant wife to the Department of Homeland Security and DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin.
The online reaction was blunt, even by social media standards. Red Ax Strategies President Matt Brodsky wrote, “We are a lost state. We should cede it to Canada.”
We are a lost state. We should cede it to Canada. https://t.co/p68oigDbHg
— Matthew RJ Brodsky (@MattRJBrodsky) November 5, 2026
Conservative commentator Eric Daugherty posted, “MINNESOTA IS SO FREAKING COOKED.”
🚨 UPDATE: Somali "daycare owner" Abdi Daisane (D) has just been elected to the state Minnesota House — and is wife has BRAGGED about ILLEGALLY INVADING our country
Daisane's St. Cloud "daycare," Blooming Kids, has been cited for 16 state violations since July 2024 ‼️
"I… pic.twitter.com/9WlG5znxqK
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 4, 2026
Conservative personality Gunther Eagleman offered a shorter verdict: “Minnesota is done.”
Minnesota is done. ✅
— Gunther Eagleman™ (@GuntherEagleman) November 4, 2026
Gabriel wrote of the post she flagged, “[G]reat opportunity to do something about this.”
@DHSgov @SecMullinDHS – great opportunity to do something about this
— Brigitte Gabriel (@ACTBrigitte) November 5, 2026
Daisane will now head to the Minnesota legislature, but the public funding questions and the online controversy surrounding his campaign are not disappearing just because election night is over. In politics, the voters may cast the ballots, but the receipts have a way of sticking around.
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