5 of 10 daycare facilities in Nick Shirley’s Minnesota report were meal sites for fraud-laden ‘Feeding Our Future’ nonprofit

According to the Minnesota Star Tribune, half of the 10 daycare facilities that were visited by Shirley were also connected to Feeding Our Future as "meal sites." Altogether, the five daycare businesses got nearly $5 million from Feeding Our Future between 2018 and 2021. The five businesses that were featured in Shirley’s report have not been legally accused of wrongdoing in the case, but have been brought under higher scrutiny since Shirley's exposé.

Of the 10 daycare sites the Tribune visited, reporters with the outlet said that only four of them had any children present, and in the other cases, "Six other facilities were either closed or employees did not open their doors," the outlet said.

In one facility that was licensed for over 100 children, only 50 were present. The daycare center that was at the core of Shirley's exposé, the Quality "Learing" Center, which has since corrected a typo in its sign to "Learning", has had a slew of violations over the past few years. A Minnesota resident also said that Monday—a few days after Shirley's report—was the first time they had ever seen children at the daycare.

In 2024, the daycare had a violation for not reporting a “death, serious injury, fire or emergency as required." However, in that case, like dozens of others, the state's website said the daycare center corrected the violation with "Correction Documentation" which was then approved by Minnesota.

Shirley's exposé—where he and a Minnesota local by the name of David investigate the operation of several Somali-run daycare centers—has gone viral online, with over 130 million views on X and nearly 3 million on YouTube. After its release, the Trump administration has frozen all child care payments going to Minnesota. Some in the mainstream media and on the left have now taken aim at Shirley instead of looking deeper into his allegations of fraud.