On fraudulent unemployment benefits
So far, DOGE has uncovered seemingly-fraudulent unemployment benefits, 80% of which have been centered in three states. Bet you can guess what those states might be.
Yes, they are New York and California – and I’ll get to the third in a moment. One would expect California, however, just on the basis of population alone because it’s the most populous state in the US. New York is not number two in population, however; that’s Texas, and number three is Florida. Then comes New York.
What’s the third state in the fraud sweepstakes? Why, Massachusetts of course (those who live in New England probably know why I wrote “of course”). And yet Massachusetts is only number sixteen on the population list.
What do these three states also have in common? This:
Fox News points out that California, New York, and Massachusetts are all governed entirely by Democrats, holding what’s known as a “Democratic trifecta” — control of the state legislature and governor’s office. They also hold a “Democratic triplex,” meaning Democrats occupy the top three statewide executive positions: governor, attorney general, and secretary of state.
Fancy that.
Much more at the link if you want some of the details.
It all makes me wonder how the left criticizes this, because criticize it they do. One method of which you are almost certainly already aware is to say that Musk is an (unelected!) lying liar who lies and whose motive is to steal. Another is to simply ignore the topic. Still another is to say that the amount of fraud is really peanuts in the great scheme of things.
But in terms of this particular story about unemployment benefits fraud, we have this extremely odd explanation from the NY Times. I had some trouble reading the whole thing because of the firewall, and there may have been some that I missed although I think I got it all.
The headline and subtitle of the piece – probably the only part most people will read, anyway – serve to ostensibly debunk DOGE’s findings, or at least partially debunk them: “Musk’s Latest Fraud Finding Isn’t What It Seems: His team found cases of seemingly fake people receiving unemployment benefits. But that fake data exists for a reason.” For the headline readers, that’s probably enough to make them decide it’s just nasty old Elon lying again, nothing to see here. But reading the piece gives you this sort of thing:
“Your tax dollars were going to pay fraudulent unemployment claims for fake people born in the future!” Mr. Musk posted on X, his social media platform. “This is so crazy that I had to read it several times before it sank in.” …
These were, indeed, probably fake people — but in a different way than Mr. Musk seemed to realize. It was also most likely a case of his team discovering fraud that had already been discovered by someone else.
What? So there was fraud but Musk wasn’t the first to discover it? Do the American people really care about that aspect – and why did the early fraud-detectors seemingly do nothing to end it?
More:
The issue dates to early in the pandemic when millions of Americans surged onto state unemployment rolls in an unprecedented expansion of the safety net. The emergency aid program enacted during President Trump’s first term was also susceptible to fraud. As many as 15 percent of unemployment claims were fraudulent, often using stolen identities.
Yes, I think we already knew that. I recall reading at the time that there were not enough safeguards against fraud in this program that was rushed though. My assumption was that there would be plenty of fraud, and I even seem to recall reading that there indeed was fraud.
More:
To preserve records of that fraud and protect victims of the identity theft, the U.S. Labor Department encouraged state agencies that administer unemployment benefits to create “pseudo claim” records — in effect, to tie real cases of fraud in their data to make-believe people. The implausibility of the records was the point. Agencies were seeking a way to keep track of fraud claims while detaching them from the identities of innocent people who might one day apply for unemployment benefits themselves.
If I understand that, then these claims were fraudulent and the fake birth dates were “flags” for the fraudulent claims. So it’s not as though the agencies didn’t notice that a child or a person who was 150 years old was making a claim that was obviously false. It’s that the fake birthdates were assigned to mark the probably fraudulent claims – claims which were paid. Nor was this money ever recovered, as far as I can tell.
More:
The cases they cite probably do refer to real instances of people fraudulently receiving benefits, said current and former unemployment officials with the Labor Department and state work force agencies. But it is not the case, those officials said, that a hapless government was duped into doling out benefits to people it didn’t realize weren’t even born yet.
It seems that what the piece in the Times is saying is that the fraud was very real but that the government wasn’t as stupid as it seems from the evidence of the fake birthdates – that those were intentional. But what most people care about is that there was and is fraud, and that the government paid fraudulent claims and that these “people” are still on the rolls. The fact that previous administrations may have known this (but did nothing about it) isn’t really the point. And the fact that most of this occurred in those three states remains informative.
Of course, this isn’t just about fraudulent unemployment benefits. We also have this sort of thing:
DOGE also reported this week that since 2023, the U.S. Border Patrol (under the Biden administration) has paroled over 6,300 individuals flagged on the FBI’s terrorist watchlist or with criminal records into the country with “minimal screening.” Though their paroles have now been revoked, all received Social Security numbers and could access federal benefits. Among them:
– 905 received Medicaid, including 4 on the terrorist watchlist ($276K paid out)
– 41 collected Unemployment Insurance ($42K total)
– 22 received federal student loans ($280K)
– 409 got tax refunds in 2024 ($751K)
– An undisclosed number received SNAP (food stamps)Under the Biden administration, it was routine for Border Patrol to admit aliens into the United States with no legal status and minimal screening
Perhaps all of this is part of the reason for the fact that the GOP’s reputation has risen among working class voters:
According to a post-tariff Quinnipiac poll, Democrats and Republicans are now tied at 33% on the question of which party “cares more for the needs of people like you”—a dramatic shift after more than three decades of Democratic dominance on the issue. Enten added context to just how historic these numbers are, “Back in 2017, before the midterms, Democrats led by 13 points. In 2005, it was a 23-point lead. Even in 1994—a big year for Republicans—Democrats led by 19,” Enten noted. “Now? A tie. The Democrats, long seen as the party of the people? No more.”
Massachusetts is stuffed with highly educated people who mistakenly believe they run the place.
Pardon me, but is that explanation in the NY Times at all plausible?
Kate:
I wondered about that. But I think it probably is. However, all it means is that the government knew about it.
So it’s somehow better that the government knew about the fraud? And apparently did nothing other than flag the records? It must be pretty bad if this is the best face the NYT can put on it.
I hope that the law is changed that makes these types of fraud related to government programs has no statue of limitations. People need to be punished for this activity. If an illegal alien has done this, then, they should be deported and not allowed to return.
Right, Jimmy. The governments knew about it, flagged these by altering the records (and I wonder if that’s some kind of fraud by itself), and then did nothing about it.
This sort of thing is why the avalanche of false and duplicate Social Security numbers is such a big problem. With a number, illegals or fraudsters can receive all sorts of government subsidies and payments to which they are not entitled.
What’s the third state in the fraud sweepstakes? Why, Massachusetts of course (those who live in New England probably know why I wrote “of course”
No surprise from this New England native who long ago returned to my ancestral home of Texas. My sister’s car got stolen. The assumption was that it ended up in a Lynn chop shop. Lynn was next to Saugus MA, where my sister then lived.
My sister-in-law is a MA native. Her brother got involved, I am told, in some construction fraud involving the Ted Williams tunnel. He paid for it, I am told.
Speaking of Lynn: Lynn, Lynn, city of sin.
Just for grins, figure it takes $2 to put a lunch on a poor kid’s school table. Times 180 school days is $360. That’s what it takes to give one kid lunch for a school year.
Pick your favorite fraud and divide by $360. That’s the number of poor-kid-lunch-years which went someplace else.
There are about fifty million kids in public schools in the US.
Fraud is simply one tool in a criminal enterprise’s toolbox.
“…80% of which have been centered in three states…”
The level of fraud, and, seemingly, the ease with which it is committed and the probability that such fraud is enabled by a particular flavor, and behavior, of government, would seem the perfect reason for terminating all federal aid and payments, down to the last nickel, pending the correction of the fraud and the instituting of solid preventive measures.
CA, NY and MA, or any state for that matter, should be able to freely squander their taxpayers’ money in any quantity and manner they choose – it’s a self-inflcted wound for whomever has chosen to live there – but once they reach outside their borders into federal taxpayers’ pockets, the rest of us should have a say in the matter. Not that fraud, of any degree or amount, should be tolerated in any of the states, but that such a large percentage occurs in only 3 jurisdictions makes, or should make, those three an easy target for reform.
And I say “NO.”
Fortunately, the current federal administration, so far, agrees with people like me. Whether they – and I have very severe doubts about Congress’ integrity on such matters – agree enough to take action, I await the tally.
Since the NYT is obviously propagandizing here at the behest of some government insider, you have to click through, you have to read the NYT article (maybe using archive.is) AND their links to what they say their sources are. So here in the DOL guidance is the “pseudo-claim” language:
It says nothing in the there about putting obviously fake birth years into the pseudo-claim. It certainly does not say such claims should have been paid. There are many ways to tag such things in databases and you don’t have to make fake birth years.
And that guidance was only in cases for cases of identity theft, which would not be all the fraud, of course.
The real story that the NYT is trying to distract from, is that it was up to states to administer the program, and quite a few states did not want to avoid paying fraudulent claims. Because that would be tiresome and costly work by state employees, might embarrass connected people and their clients, expose how much illegal immigrants and criminals are costing, and it’s not the state’s money.
“We knew it all the time and paid it anyway, and didn’t say anything until Musk started talking about it” is not an excuse that can be expected to go over well with normal people.
I think Niketas has called it.
They didn’t quite know it, altho It Was Known, thus not much news, especially how much cash was lost.
While it would be nice to somehow make those states pay, there’s already too much Federal control and especially influence, based on Fed cash. Still, using that as leverage to get states to be more responsible seems better than just continuing to write more checks.
These frauds are each small or medium crimes, and J Justice demands some punishment. To protect Rule of Law.
Unemployment compensation is one of the few state and local activities properly financed by the central government (unless you’re going to turn over administration to the feds as well). The others would be Medicaid, maintenance of long-haul Interstates, and (episodic) disaster relief. You add to these four an unrestricted grant to the states and territories of a value north of 2% of gross domestic product and distributed according to a formula; each state’s share would be directly correlated with a state’s resident population and with the ratio of employee compensation to the population over 14 and inversely correlated with the state’s personal income per capita. The most affluent jurisdictions (Connecticut, New Jersey, DC) would receive a grant of $0, the least affluent (off shore dependencies, Mississippi, West Virginia &c) would receive the highest per capita. In re grants to localities, these should be limited to episodic disaster relief and to property tax payments on federal real estate.
Very strange that Illinois did not show up on that list of miscreants or at least receive “honorable mention”….
And WRT Elon Musk, the Democratic Party scum does indeed rise to the top…
https://instapundit.com/714231/
Key Graf:
‘Just back from George Clooney’s “Good Night and Good Luck,” Broadway play, which is a story about the importance of trust & honesty in news. The play ends with @elonmusk on screen allegedly giving a Nazi salute.…’
+ Bonus (merely more election integrity, Democratic-Party style)…
“…Arizona to begin removing as many as 50K noncitizens from voter rolls following lawsuit”—-
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/scoop-arizona-begin-removing-many-50k-non-citizens-from-voter-rolls-following-lawsuit