Keith Ellison, Feeding Our Future, unanswered questions

Even after his epic 2-hour appearance before the House Fraud Prevention committee on Monday morning, many important questions remain unanswered regarding the relationship between state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the disgraced nonprofit Feeding Our Future.

After the hearing concluded, the committee chair, Rep. Kristin Robbins (R-Maple Grove), issued a press release including additional questions for Mr. Ellison.

Questions were raised before the hearing even concluded (viewable here). At 1:46:37 Chair Robbins asks Ellison if he had received any subsequent emails or other communications for the attendees at the 12/11/2021 meeting with Feeding Our Future. Ellison said that he didn’t recall any but added that he would check.

At 1:48:00 Rep. Robbins asks if Ellison had received any campaign donations from anyone associated with Feeding Our Future.

His response at 1:48:06:

Not from anyone in that meeting. There were people who sent me donations that were ancillary, if that’s the word, connected to this, I sent the ones I’m aware of elsewhere.

Ellison added:

I actually sent a check back to a lawyer connected to this, once it became clear they were in some way a part of this. I said, “We can’t accept your money,” and sent it back.

To refresh the Attorney General’s memory, I documented all of the Feeding Our Future-related donations he received in 2021 and 2022 in this post. Ellison received six maximum $2,500 donations totaling $15,000. Four of those donations were received together on December 20, 2021, nine days after the recorded meeting.

One of those four donations was from a businessman named Mahad Hassan. He is believed to have been present at the 12/11/21 meeting with Ellison. Hassan has not been accused of any wrongdoing in the case. In either instance, it’s not a major plot point. More importantly, what happened to the money?

At 1:49:40, Rep. Robbins asks specifically for Ellison to follow up about the fates of donations from two who have been accused: Liban Alishire and Gandi Mohamed (Defendant Nos. 36 and 69, respectively). Liban later pled guilty and Gandi has yet to go to trial in the case.

According to Ellison’s campaign finance filings, Liban donated $2,500 on May 27, 2022. His donation was returned on September 20, 2022, on or about the date Liban’s indictment was made public.

Ellison reports only three other returned donations in 2022. One returned donation was to Sam Bankman-Fried, the convicted cryptocurrency fraudster. The other returned donations were to lawyers, one based on Washington, D.C., and one based in Minneapolis. No other returns in subsequent years match anyone related to Feeding Our Future. So, with the exception of Liban, Ellison appears to have kept the remaining $12,500.

In her post-hearing statement, Rep. Robbins says:

There are still unresolved questions about when the Attorney General became aware of Feeding Our Future’s misconduct, how vigorously he defended his clients, the state agencies, and whether he put undue pressure on agencies to back down. We need full transparency to ensure that Minnesotans’ taxpayer dollars are protected, and that our state’s top legal office is held to the highest standards of integrity.

The statement also notes:

Further concerns were raised about political contributions Ellison received from individuals later indicted in the scandal, and whether follow-up actions were taken after Ellison requested the names of businesses experiencing problems with state agencies.

The committee intends to continue investigating these matters to protect taxpayers and restore accountability and trust in Minnesota’s institutions.

In my very first post on this topic, before I had heard the recording, I posed a series of questions. Here we are three weeks later, and we still don’t have answers to two of the most basic questions: Who was at the meeting and where did it take place?

So many questions, so few answers.