Peggy Flanagan says fraud “is completely unacceptable” and contrasts Minnesota prosecuting fraudsters with Trump “pardoning” them
Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota and Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, interviewed on Lovett or Leave It
“Fraud of any kind is completely unacceptable.” … “I would just say, you know, that more should have been done … sooner and more needs to be done.” … “I would say that it’s not OK for anyone, right, to commit fraud.” … “I think the difference, right, is that Minnesota is prosecuting fraudsters, including the woman who is in charge of Feeding Our Future, Aimee Bock, who received over 41 years in prison.” … “And in Washington, Donald Trump is pardoning the fraudsters who are literally stealing money from Medicaid. Like, we’re not the same. And, you know, Michelle Tafoya hasn’t said anything about that. She’s just fine with it.”
Source and context
Original video
About this source
Weekly comedy and politics podcast, published on YouTube at 9:00 a.m. EDT on September 20, 2026. Host Jon Lovett interviews Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Minnesota. No official transcript or captions were available; quotations here were checked against two independent transcriptions of the published audio.
Before the quotation
Host Jon Lovett introduced the fraud scandal as Tafoya’s “main line of attack,” noting that as lieutenant governor Flanagan was “not approving invoices” and “not in that direct line of authority,” but that Tafoya was “still trying to tag” her with it.
After the quotation
Flanagan went on to say she personally benefited as a child from public assistance programs of the kind targeted by the fraud, and that Trump’s administration should face additional regulations and policies “so people can’t do this right out of the White House,” referring to his pardons of Medicaid fraudsters.
How this statement is classified
Case context: Michele Tafoya’s accusation that Peggy Flanagan is “hiding from” Minnesota’s welfare-fraud scandal
The label describes this statement’s response within the context above.
Why this label?
The case’s fixed reference point is Tafoya’s accusation that Flanagan hid from the fraud and let it happen. Flanagan does not deny that fraud occurred, but she rejects the accusation as directed at her: she says fraud is unacceptable, points to steps taken since (an inspector general’s office, harsher penalties) and to Minnesota prosecuting the scheme’s leader, and contrasts that with Trump’s pardons and Tafoya’s silence about them. That answers and rejects the accusation rather than accepting it. The closest competing label is mixed_or_conditional, because she also says “more should have been done… sooner and more needs to be done”; it loses because that is a passive, impersonal statement about the state’s response generally, and she never says in the first person that she hid from or allowed the fraud.
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- People and groups discussed
- Michele Tafoya
Michele Tafoya’s accusation that Peggy Flanagan is “hiding from” Minnesota’s welfare-fraud scandal
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More from this case
Read the full case“Peggy Flanagan is hiding from the fraud. She let it happen. Minnesotans have noticed. That’s why this race is a statistical tie. I’ve been in every corner of this state, and I keep hearing the same thing: people are done making excuses for their leaders.”Read statement