Olson In-Studio on Newsmax: Minnesota Fraud & ICE Shooting
Jan 11, 2026Byline: American Pulse Staff
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Dustin Olson, lead pollster at American Pulse Research & Polling, joined NEWSMAX's Sunday Report In-Studio to discuss a couple of recent issues. They addressed a few key factors in the recent ICE shooting and also discussed fraud, specifically in Minnesota and in the federal government as a whole.
Are the Protests Surrounding the ICE Shooting an Attempt to Distract from the Fraud?
Olson was first asked about the recent ICE shooting of an ICE tracker after she appeared to hit him with her car while obstructing an ICE operation. He noted that some of the local officials stirring up tensions may be doing so in part to divert scrutiny away from them following revelations of massive fraud taking place under their watch:
"My impression of all of this is that ultimately, what we're seeing is a big attempt to try to distract away from the issue of fraud. That's what brought all this to the forefront and has people very concerned. You know, when Elon Musk was starting the DOGE project, he estimated that there might be a trillion dollars of fraud in the federal government spending."
Olson added that politicians may have allowed the situation to escalate, suggesting that confrontation benefits those who would rather avoid scrutiny over growing fraud revelations.
“They wanted to have something to distract away from the fraud, and they've been spoiling for this fight. I don't think they wanted someone to die, but I do think that they wanted to have this kind of fireworks happening because of the unprecedented level of fraud that we're seeing in Minnesota.”
Minnesota Fraud: Another Tammany Hall?
Olson was then asked about how some Minnesota officials knew about the fraud happening thanks to whistleblowers but did nothing despite this, even going as far as to discourage the whistleblowers from coming forward. He likened the whole situation to the infamous Tammany Hall scandal:
"This actually feels kind of like a Tammany Hall situation where you have political leaders like the AG, the governor, even the mayor, whose wife, I believe, worked for the law firm that represents some of these groups that are alleged to have committed the fraud. So this goes through all of the political classes in the state, and I think it's a real problem."
New Cell-Phone Footage from ICE Officer Gives Additional Perspective
The conversation then moved to new mobile phone footage from one of the ICE officers on scene and whether or not that will change the narrative surrounding the story. Olson called out the way the legacy media has handled the entire episode:
"This is one of the worst examples of media gaslighting we’ve seen yet. You have basically two movies on the same screen. You have people saying that this was absolutely an accident, and others saying it was intentional. But ultimately, I think we're seeing people just pretending like they're not seeing what they're seeing."
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