When the jury returned its guilty verdicts in the Feeding Our Future trial of Aimee Bock and Salim Said I wrote the Free Beacon column “From Feeding the Kids to Fleecing the Government: Inside the Country’s Largest COVID Fraud.” Having sat through the trial every day for five weeks, I thought the story underlying the case deserved a wide national audience.

I wondered where state authorities were while the funds continued to roll out the door from the Minnesota Department of Education to Bock and her co-conspirators through 2021. Governor Tim Walz has bragged with respect to the colossal fraud in this case that “we caught it very early.” He declined to respond to any of the related questions I submitted to him in writing—twice, the second time in response to an email asking me to submit my questions to another email address.

Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison has bragged (about President Donald Trump): “I know a scam when I see one.” He too declined to answer my questions asking when he saw that Feeding Our Future and its sites were operating a scam and what he did about it.

Assistant United States Attorney Joe Thompson has served as the lead prosecutor in the sprawling Feeding Our Future case. In the Bock trial post-verdict press conference, Joe aptly called the Feeding Our Future fraud “the shame of Minnesota.” In the Free Beacon column I wrote that Thompson and fellow AUSAs Matthew Ebert, Harry Jacobs, and Dan Bobier had proved themselves the pride of Minnesota.

President Trump has nominated my friend Daniel Rosen to serve as United States Attorney for Minnesota. Pending Danny’s confirmation, President Trump has appointed Joe Thompson to serve as Acting United States Attorney. On Monday a Department of Justice press release announced his appointment:

Joseph H. Thompson, who has served as a federal prosecutor for sixteen years, has been appointed by President Donald J. Trump to serve as the Acting United States Attorney for the District of Minnesota.

“I am honored and humbled to be asked to lead the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota,” said Mr. Thompson. “I look forward to continuing our office’s work combatting violent crime, the scourge of fentanyl and other deadly drugs, and the shocking and unacceptable levels of fraud in our state government programs.”

Mr. Thompson has served as a federal prosecutor for more than sixteen years, first in the Northern District of Illinois and since 2014 in the District of Minnesota. In that time, Mr. Thompson has investigated and prosecuted hundreds of cases, many of which involve matters of national and international significance. Most recently, Mr. Thompson has served as the Chief of the Fraud & Public Corruption section. In this role, Mr. Thompson has overseen an unprecedented effort by the U.S. Attorney’s Office to prosecute fraud against state and federal government programs, including as the lead prosecutor in the Feeding Our Future investigation, which has been recognized by the Department of Justice as the largest Covid-19 fraud in the United States.

From 2023 to 2024, Mr. Thompson served on the Special Counsel team investigating the mishandling of classified documents found at the Penn-Biden Center in Washington, DC, and the personal residence of President Joseph R. Biden in Wilmington, Delaware.

Mr. Thompson previously served as a federal prosecutor in Chicago from 2009 to 2014, where he prosecuted street gangs, drug cartels, corrupt politicians, and domestic terrorists….

I would like to claim credit for bringing Joe to the attention of the Trump administration on Power Line and the Free Beacon, but that would be a lame attempt at humor. Joe’s work speaks for itself and has brought him the recognition of his current appointment. Serious congratulations are in order, both to President Trump and to Joe Thompson.

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