Additional archived reporting also identified Ahmed as a member of Klobuchar’s 2006 campaign staff. Federal campaign-finance records cited in the reporting indicate that Klobuchar’s campaign paid Ahmed nearly $8,000 during that election cycle.
The connection dates back roughly two decades, long before Ahmed became the head of Milestone Development Center.
But the old campaign relationship is now drawing scrutiny because Milestone is one of two providers currently facing an investigation by the Minnesota Department of Human Services.
DHS has confirmed that it has open investigations involving both Milestone Development Center and Spectrum Therapy Center. The department has declined to publicly disclose the details of the investigations because they remain active.
The providers were also terminated from Minnesota’s Medicaid program during the state’s 2026 revalidation process. Both organizations have appealed those decisions.
The state’s revalidation effort was part of a broader review of high-risk Medicaid providers. DHS says it reviewed nearly 5,600 providers and disenrolled 3,411 after they failed to meet revalidation requirements.
That distinction is important.
Ahmed has not been charged with a crime, and there is no public evidence establishing that Klobuchar participated in or had knowledge of any conduct currently being examined by state officials.
The allegations involving Milestone instead stem, in part, from concerns raised by a former therapist. The former employee told Alpha News that he observed what he believed were problems involving staffing, professional oversight, treatment and documentation.
Those allegations remain allegations and have not been proven in court.
Ahmed has rejected the accusations and criticized Alpha News’ coverage as biased. Milestone has also disputed the allegations surrounding its operations.
The political timing has nevertheless made the old campaign connection particularly noteworthy.
Klobuchar is now running for governor of Minnesota, and one of the central themes of her campaign is government accountability and the fight against fraud.
Her campaign’s official policy platform calls for “Immediate action to root out fraud” and proposes a “top-to-bottom audit” of state government. Her plan also calls for greater oversight, stronger screening of contractors and additional monitoring of government payments.
Klobuchar has separately said that a top-to-bottom examination of state government would be among her priorities if elected governor.
That creates an obvious political question: How should voters interpret a decades-old relationship between a former campaign staffer and a candidate who is now making fraud prevention a major campaign issue?
Republican state Rep. Max Rymer has already weighed in.
“Fraud is so engrained in the Minnesota Democrat Party — a feature of their political apparatus, not a bug,” Rymer wrote on X.
Rymer also pointed to what he described as a broader political culture involving “friendly photos together, financial earmarks for them, promises to protect them in closed door meetings.”
“A never-ending insult to Minnesotans,” he added.
Those are Rymer’s political allegations, not findings by Minnesota investigators.
Ahmed’s political history extends beyond her work for Klobuchar. In 2006, she was described as a Somali community activist who had attracted interest from multiple political campaigns before deciding to join Klobuchar’s Senate effort.
The Mshale profile said Ahmed supported Klobuchar because she believed Somali immigrants “should be accommodated to achieve their American dream.”
Nearly 20 years later, Ahmed is at the center of an entirely different public controversy.
The DHS investigation has also become politically significant because of Ahmed’s relationship with Flanagan. Fox News reported that Ahmed, who operates Milestone, is a longtime friend of the Minnesota lieutenant governor and appeared with her in a viral video.
Still, the available evidence establishes a past political relationship between Ahmed and Klobuchar—not wrongdoing by Klobuchar.
For now, the key facts remain straightforward: Milestone is under an active DHS investigation; the provider was terminated from Minnesota’s Medicaid program during the 2026 revalidation process and has appealed; Ahmed denies wrongdoing; and Klobuchar’s campaign relationship with Ahmed dates to 2006.
What state investigators ultimately determine about Milestone remains unresolved.
For Klobuchar, however, the resurfacing of a former campaign associate comes at a politically sensitive moment, as she campaigns for governor while making government oversight and fraud prevention major components of her platform.
