St. Cloud Senator Aric Putnam Authored Legislation to Award Taxpayer Funds to Two Somali Non-profits Violating Federal and State Laws

Like other Democrats, Aric Putnam loves handing out taxpayer money to political friends with non-profits, even if they may be violating the law. Unfortunately for Aric, people have started to notice.

Media reports have documented several cases of legislators awarding taxpayer funds to suspicious non-profits who violate state and federal laws.

In one particularly egregious example, Putnam authored and passed funding for a Somali non-profit ran by a known fraudster called Ka Joog. While drafting and passing funding for Ka Joog, the following red-flags were already known:

·       The chair of Ka Joog’s board had been charged for fraud.

·       Ka Joog hadn’t submitted required filings to the IRS in years.

·       Ka Joog’s non-profit status had been revoked by the IRS for noncompliance.

·       Ka Joog had not registered with the Attorney General’s Office as non-profits are required to.

It turns out this wasn’t a one-time mistake for Putnam. He has a serious history of handing out taxpayer money to non-profits with big red-flags. It’s no longer a question if Aric Putnam is enabling fraud, the only question left is whether it’s because of incompetence, corruption, or both.

OneCommunity Alliance

A small non-profit created by St. Cloud City Council member Hudda Ibrahim. The organization advertises that it provides housing consultation services to first-time homebuyers. Their most recent IRS filing shows $221,380 in revenue for 2025, with the only paid employs being Hudda and her husband Tajir Rage. Combined, they are paid $90,526, or over 40% of the organization’s total revenue.

Hubba and Tajir have been in the news lately for their connection to a voter fraud investigation. During the 2024 election, Tajir was spotted bussing many members of the St. Cloud Somali community to polls and election offices, seemingly in support of his wife’s campaign for city council. He reportedly would offer to translate for Somali voters, but would become frustrated when election officials asked for him to translate the voter oath attesting to the voter being a citizen. Election officials commented that he would seemingly not translate the full oath.

On another occasion, Tajir was seen assisting a woman drop off a mail-in ballot, only for the two to appear shortly later dropping off an additional ballot for the same voter. Police officers confronted Tajir, who provided a fake name to law enforcement.

Despite these red flags, Aric Putnam authored a bill (SF 2948) to directly award OneCommunity Alliance with $600,000, far more than the organization has ever seen in revenue. Putnam’s bill ultimately passed off the Senate floor as part of the Economic Development finance bill (SF 1832) but the appropriation was reduced to $200,000.

While working to give this small non-profit a massive amount in taxpayer funds, Aric Putnam didn’t bother to do the most basic background research into the political allies he wanted to enrich. Unsurprisingly, OneCommunity is violating basic transparency laws required of non-profits, and is not registered with the Attorney General’s office.

Hooyo Hour

On the board of OneCommunity Alliance is Hodan Omar, the founder of another small non-profit in St. Cloud called Hooyo Hour. This non-profit advertises a variety of services including employment, refugee, and education support. Unlike OneCommunity, Hooyo took the time to register with the Attorney General’s office. The financial information they provided shows $192,316 for 2025.

The connections to other sketchy groups didn't stop Aric Putnam from drafting a bill in 2025 to directly award Hooyo Hour with $300,000 in taxpayer money to provide workforce development services for “youth from East African communities.” Aric authored and introduced SF 2949 to provide Hooyo hour this funding. It passed off the Senate floor along with the OneCommunity Alliance appropriation in SF 1832 later that year.

“Was awesome to have Majority Leader Murphy join us for a conversation with our friends at Hooyo Hour and the Young People’s Collective about making our community the best it can be for all our neighbors. Thanks for hanging out!” – Aric Putnam via Facebook 3/31/2026

Even Walz is Sick of Putnam’s Fraud

While Governor Walz has rightfully been taking the bulk of the blame for Minnesota’s fraud crisis, Democrat legislators like Aric Putnam have handed out so much money to fraudsters and suspicious non-profits that even Walz wants to put an end to it.

During the Democrat trifecta, the problem of legislatively named grants, or legislators earmarking funds for particular organizations, became abundantly clear. Rather than a competitive process to award the most qualified organizations with taxpayer funds, this process relied on relationships with legislators.

Extensive reporting has found the over $1 billion legislators directly awarded to non-profits in 2023 and 2024 to be problematic. This practice was condemned by Governor Walz’s Director of Program Integrity, Tim O’Malley, in his 2026 report. Governor Walz then wanted to end legislatively named grants in his 2026 budget recommendations.

Unfortunately, Democrat politicians like Aric Putnam want to continue giving their friends taxpayer money.

Aric Putnam’s taxpayer funded handouts to shady non-profits have caused so many problems even Tim Walz wants to end it. If Aric Putnam’s fraud is too much for Tim Walz, it’s definitely too much for St. Cloud.