“Some people might not know who Nick Shirley is yet, but one day, they will.”

Five and a half years later, that has proven to be an amazingly prescient statement.

Shirley is all over the national news following a 40-plus minute documentary on alleged fraud involving various businesses, primarily daycare facilities in Minnesota.

The expose has been viewed over 133 million times on X.

Ryan Comer, Standard-Examiner

“We uncovered over $110,000,000 in ONE day,” Shirley said in a message attached to the post that included the video on Dec. 26. “Like it and share it around like wildfire! Its time to hold these corrupt politicians and fraudsters accountable.”

In that same post, Shirley called it potentially his “most important work yet.”

The video has been quote posted in support on X by Vice President JD Vance, Donald Trump Jr., Elon Musk, the official account of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, Texas senator Ted Cruz, podcaster Patrick Bet-David, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, podcaster and comedian Adam Corolla and former Donald Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, among many, many others.

Predictably, commentary from the left has been less flattering. Nate Blouin, the ultra progressive endorsed by Vermont socialist Bernie Sanders running for the new first congressional district in Salt Lake County, has been particularly critical of Shirley, attacking and amplifying attacks on his methods and potential motives.

Mehdi Hasan, a “British-American journalist” and “Editor-in-chief and CEO of new media company  @zeteo_news,” according to his X profile, resorted to an ad hominem attack, saying Shirley “comes across as an incoherent, stuttering fool.”

Blouin reposted that attack.

I don’t know Shirley, but it’s hard to assign such harsh motives and be so personally critical when I read a story like the one done on Dec. 24, 2019, by ABC4 in Utah. The headline reads: “WATCH: Farmington senior raised and gifted $2000 to his teachers; watch their emotional reaction.”

Shirley was that senior.

According to the story:

“Shirley found out that one of his teachers had medical bills to pay and the other must pay a lot for daycare each month.

“Shirley set up a Go Fund Me page a few months ago to raise the funds. He also visited local businesses and contacted a local Congress man. With the $2000, Shirley was able to gift each teacher $1000.”

Seems like a pretty good guy to me.

On CNN’s NewsNight with Abby Phillip, time discussing the video was mostly spent challenging newsworthiness and methods while deflecting with attacks against Trump and other Republican leaders.

Little time was spent trying to refute anything Shirley presented.

One may not agree with the conclusions that Shirley reached or his investigative methods, but let’s be honest here. If a liberal activist did a 40-plus minute video that exposed some sort of Republican corruption, in exactly the same way that Shirley did, these same liberals would be heralding it as groundbreaking and democracy-saving, and the person would almost certainly receive a Pulitzer for it.

The truth is, Shirley went into a community and conducted his own investigation including his own interviews, which he put on camera for people to see. In an interview with CNN, Shirley said, “Well, we showed you guys what was happening and then you guys can go ahead and make your own analysis.”

One aspect of the video that’s especially compelling to me that speaks to its credibility is the inclusion of someone who has spent years researching these fraud allegations. This person, David, has an office in Minneapolis.

“I’m sort of in the heart of all of this fraud, and I would see these child care centers,” he said. “I said, ‘Well, there aren’t any kids there.’ It’s the middle of the day, and all I see are a couple of guys standing out front smoking, and then I’d go by another daycare, and I’d see the same thing. I said, ‘Well, where do these kids play?’ And so I started to go online and look, and I said, ‘This place is licensed for 80 children.’ They had zero children. Every time I went by there, they never had a single child there.”

Speaking more about his motives, David said:

“It’s fraud. And the reason I’m involved is I want it to stop. I care about Minnesota. I’m doing this for the people of Minnesota. I don’t make a dime off all this time I’ve spent on this. I put my life at risk several times, but I’m determined to see this through and to correct what is wrong, what is evil.”

Shirley and David went to numerous supposed businesses, including daycares, an autism center and health care providers.

They showed one building that was supposed to be open from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., but when they knocked on the door, nobody answered. One building was labeled “Quality Learing Center” (Yes, the typo was part of the signage).

Throughout the video, they are criticized by various people suspected of being involved who they attempt to interview. Nobody is very forthcoming.

At one point, the police are called to escort Shirley and David out of a building.

A woman went to one of the facilities where Shirley went and repeatedly shouted not to open up because she said Shirley was ICE.

One man stated that he had lived in the area since 2017 and had never seen a child go into one of the daycare centers.

At the conclusion of the video, Shirley went to the Capitol building where he spoke with a representative who said fraud is an issue in every state and the Trump administration was guilty of fraud.

“People deserve to know where their taxes are going,” Shirley said in the video. “If these companies and these daycare centers are making upwards of $2.6 million and there’s no children to be seen anywhere, something fraudulent is happening. And that is not making you racist, Islamophobic. This is just the truth of what’s happening here in Minnesota.”

Fair points. Crazy that words so intuitively easy to understand and agree with would be part of what helped a guy from Farmington become as famous as once predicted.

Contact Standard-Examiner editor Ryan Comer at rcomer@standard.net.