Democratic Senate hopeful Graham Platner of Maine is urging supporters to bankroll an anti-ICE organization whose leadership overlaps with a Somali-led nonprofit now under congressional scrutiny for allegedly siphoning off millions in improper Medicaid payments.
According to the Washington Free Beacon, Platners appeal came just one day after Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a statewide enforcement operation targeting illegal aliens in Maine.
The candidate used his Instagram account to promote the Maine Immigrants Rights Coalition (MIRC), a taxpayer-funded nonprofit that earlier this month advertised an ICE Watch Hotline to monitor federal immigration activity. MIRCs board has included Somali-born state representative Deqa Dhalac and Nathan Davis, both identified as persons of interest in a House investigation into Gateway Community Services Maine, a social-services provider accused of extensive billing fraud.
Maine is reeling from ICE's latest assault. Those incarcerated, and their families, need our support, Platner wrote on Thursday, framing federal immigration enforcement as an attack on the states communities. I'm asking you, if you have anything to spare, to consider contributing to the Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition. See the link in my bio, and please spread this far and wide. His fundraising push underscores how far the Democratic left has moved from basic immigration enforcement, with a Senate candidate effectively directing donors toward a group that seeks to obstruct ICE operations rather than cooperate with lawful federal authority.
Dhalac, who represents Maines 120th district and has campaigned alongside Platner, served as assistant executive director of Gateway Community Services Maine from May 2022 to March 2023. She has been a founding member of MIRCs board since 2017 and remained its vice president until last month, when she was named a person of interest in the congressional probe.
Davis, who joined Gateway Community Services Maine in May 2022 and became its executive director in June, continues to sit on MIRCs board as an at-large member, further entangling the immigrant-advocacy nonprofit with the embattled service provider at the center of the investigation.
Platners embrace of MIRC, which claims to be dedicated to the advancement of legal, social, and economic outcomes for immigrants in the state of Maine, dovetails with his long-standing hostility to immigration enforcement. He has repeatedly called for the abolition of ICE and vowed to drag every single ICE agent that's been wearing a mask in front of a Senate subcommittee, rhetoric that treats federal officers as political enemies rather than public servants.
A self-described communist who once displayed a neo-Nazi tattoo, Platner has also brushed aside the allegations surrounding Gateway Community Services Maine and Dhalac, publicly describing her as a very good friend and a longtime fighter for justice and decency at a rally earlier this month.
Another MIRC board member, Amran Osman, has also been employed by Gateway Community Services Maine, working as a community resources coordinator from May 2021 to April 2023, according to her LinkedIn profile. While she has not been named a person of interest in the congressional inquiry, her dual roles illustrate the close institutional ties between MIRC and Gateway.
Osman additionally founded Generational Noor, a nonprofit fiscally sponsored by MIRC that focuses on substance abuse within immigrant and BIPOC communities, a mission that has attracted public funding even as questions mount about the broader networks financial practices.
Last month, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee demanded Treasury Department records related to Gateway Community Services Maine and several other nonprofits as part of a sweeping investigation into alleged billing fraud. The Department of Homeland Security is simultaneously examining Gateways hiring practices, scrutinizing how the organization staffed and operated its wraparound services, which include health care, job search assistance, and social services for immigrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers. These parallel probes suggest federal authorities are increasingly wary of how certain progressive-aligned nonprofits have leveraged generous public funding with minimal accountability.
Although neither Dhalac nor Davis has been formally accused of criminal conduct, a former Gateway billing specialist has alleged that the organizations questionable practices intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Christopher Bernardini, who worked for Gateway from 2018 to 2025, told a reporter last month that Gateway Community Services Maine billed Maines Medicaid program, MaineCare, for services never rendered by falsifying client records. He further claimed that Gateway, which received $28.8 million in MaineCare payments between 2019 and 2024, misused Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funds by paying bonuses and maintaining no-show staff positions, behavior that, if substantiated, would represent a serious abuse of emergency federal relief.
Federal records indicate that Gateway Community Services Maine and its affiliated entity, Gateway Community Services, received $700,000 in PPP funds during the pandemic. State investigators have already identified more than $662,000 in MaineCare overpayments from 2015 to 2018, along with an additional $1.07 million in overpayments between March 2021 and December 2022. These figures point to a pattern of financial irregularities that raises obvious concerns about stewardship of taxpayer dollars, particularly when those funds are routed through ideologically driven nonprofits that also play an active role in partisan politics.
MIRCs own leadership has not escaped scrutiny. The coalitions board president, Fatuma Hussein, and Gateway founder and CEO Abdullahi Ali reportedly received favorable no-bid contracts funded with COVID-19 relief money from Maines Democratic governor between 2022 and 2024. At the same time, they were organizing large-scale canvassing and voter turnout operations that benefited Democrats, according to a local news investigation, blurring the line between public health spending and partisan political mobilization.
Financial records reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon show that MIRC has taken in nearly $3.85 million in government grants between 2022 and 2024, accounting for roughly 44 percent of its total revenue. That haul includes a $689,000 grant from Maines Office of Population Health Equity, awarded while Dhalac served both on the offices Health Equity Advisory Council and as MIRCs vice president, a dual role that raises questions about conflicts of interest and insider influence in the distribution of public funds.
Despite the mounting controversy, Platner has continued to appear publicly with Dhalac and other figures tied to Gateway and MIRC. Earlier this month, at a Tax the Rich to Fund Health Care rally, Dhalac introduced Platner, praised his candidacy, and hailed him as the states next senator, signaling that the alliance between the Senate hopeful and the embattled activist network remains intact. Their shared platformhigher taxes, expanded welfare programs, and hostility to immigration enforcementstands in stark contrast to the priorities of voters who favor the rule of law, fiscal restraint, and secure borders.
Dhalac also joined Platner at a December 13 event in Lewiston, Maine, organized by Somali-born left-wing activist and former Gateway employee Safiya Khalid, with Osman in attendance as well.
The gathering underscored the tight-knit nature of this progressive ecosystem, in which taxpayer-funded nonprofits, political campaigns, and activist groups operate in close coordination while drawing heavily on public money.
Platner, Dhalac, and MIRC did not respond to requests for comment, leaving Maine voters to weigh for themselves whether a candidate who champions defunding ICE and fundraising for an anti-enforcement nonprofit entangled in a federal fraud probe can credibly claim to uphold law, order, and responsible stewardship of taxpayer resources.
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