The Justice Department announced charges against 15 people in Minnesota accused of defrauding state Medicaid and social services programs of over $90 million.

Two of the defendants have been accused of defrauding $46.6 million through false claims to Medicaid for autism clinics, while others were charged with filing fraudulent claims for services provided by programs that help people with disabilities live independently. The charges constitute the “highest loss amount ever charged” in a Minnesota Medicaid case, Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald said during a press conference Thursday in Minneapolis.

The DOJ’s announcement comes as President Donald Trump’s administration increases pressure on Democratic state officials by conducting more fraud investigations — probes that have ended in withholding federal funding from blue states.

“These alleged con artists stole taxpayer dollars while providing substandard care for children and abandoning at least one Medicaid recipient as they passed away,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a press release. “The DOJ Fraud Division, along with the White House’s Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, will dismantle illegal schemes from coast-to-coast.”

Minnesota has been at the epicenter of the White House’s focus on tackling benefit fraud. Gov. Tim Walz, a vocal Trump critic, announced in January that he was withdrawing his bid for reelection after facing national scrutiny over his handling of fraud allegations in the state. The federal investigations have often centered on members of the state’s Somali community — who were targeted in an immigration crackdown when the administration sent hundreds of federal agents to the state earlier this year.

Vice President JD Vance, who is leading the White House’s new fraud task force, announced last week that the administration would similarly withhold $1.3 billion in Medicaid funding from California because the state “has not taken fraud very seriously.”

The interagency investigation in Minnesota resulted in unprecedented charges involving seven Medicaid programs. Across several cases, providers filed bogus claims and received reimbursements under false pretenses — resulting in the death of one supposed recipient of care, the DOJ said. McDonald pointed to one case that involved two people charged with exploiting Minnesota’s housing stabilization services program: Initially estimated in 2020 to cost about $2.5 million per year, the program’s costs ballooned to more than $104 million by 2024.

“One of the programs has been completely shut down because there’s no money left: It’s all gone,” McDonald said. “These services no longer exist for these vulnerable homeless populations.”

The DOJ will also expand its health care fraud investigations within the Midwest, McDonald said, again concentrating on cases within Minnesota.