A Somali fraudster linked to Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar has been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for defrauding a food program for children of at least $44 million.
Salim Said, a 37-year-old Somali man who operated the Safari Restaurant in Minneapolis, was convicted by a federal jury in March 2025 of using the Feeding Our Future nonprofit to line his own pockets with federal money.
“Said was convicted on one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, four counts of wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit federal programs bribery, eight counts of bribery, one count conspiracy to commit money laundering and five counts of money laundering,” the Department of Justice reported at the time.
During Said’s Wednesday sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Nancy Brasel slammed him for not only “enriching” himself at the expense of taxpayers but also ruining Minnesota’s reputation.
“You took more than taxpayers’ dollars to enrich yourself,” the judge said, according to the New York Post. “You took the reputation of our state down with you.”
After Said’s sentencing, the Republican-led House Oversight Committee released a statement linking him to Rep. Omar, who reportedly celebrated her 2018 primary victory at his restaurant.
“Feeding Our Future ringleader Salim Said got 30 years in prison,” the committee said in a social media post. “His Safari Restaurant was one of the largest sites defrauding the program. Rep. Ilhan Omar celebrated her 2018 primary win there. Accountability is here.”
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Feeding Our Future was founded by fellow fraudster Aimee Bock, who was also convicted in March 2025 for lining her pocket with ill-gotten federal money.
Using the nonprofit, the two gained access to hundreds of millions of dollars in federal grants that they reportedly spent on themselves instead of the children they were supposed to feed.
“Using fake meal counts, doctored attendance records, and fabricated invoices, the perpetrators of the fraud ring claimed to be serving thousands of meals a day, seven days a week, to underprivileged children,” according to prior reporting in City Journal by journalists Ryan Thorpe and Christopher Rufo.
According to the Justice Department, Said claimed during the scam that he was feeding up to 5,000 children per day, seven days a week.
“In total, Said claimed to have served over 3.9 million meals to children from the Safari Restaurant food site between April 2020 and November 2021,” the Justice Department reported.
“Said also claimed that Safari Restaurant provided more than 2.2 million meals to other food sites involved in Feeding Our Future’s fraud scheme.”
In reality, he only served at most 40 people a day, according to the New York Post.
Prosecutors slammed Said in court.
“The defendant and his sites did not serve thousands of children; he served a calculated, lucrative lie,” they said, according to the New York Post.
“For 21 consecutive months, Said made thousands of fraudulent reimbursement claims, day after day, month after month,” they added. “Each submission represented meals purportedly provided to underprivileged children, yet the listed children themselves were entirely fictitious.”
Omar is on record promoting the restaurant.
Bock, the founder of Feeding Our Future, previously suggested during a jailhouse interview that Omar knew about the fraud she and Said were committing.
“I struggle to believe that she wouldn’t have known,” she told the New York Post Post in May.
During Bock’s trial, the lawmaker’s name showed up at least six times in email and text message exhibits. Bock told the New York Post that the emails and text messages were about obtaining help with waivers.
This article originally appeared on The Western Journal and is reposted with permission.
