WASHINGTON — On Friday, Vice President JD Vance convened a meeting with key figures from the Trump administration to inaugurate his first anti-fraud task force session. The objective of the gathering was to address and potentially reverse the more lenient verification processes for social services benefits.
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“The anti-fraud mechanisms that have been part of our governmental systems for years were effectively disabled by the Biden administration,” declared Vance, who leads the task force. These comments were made during a brief opening before the meeting continued privately.
“Fraud has long been an issue, but it escalated significantly under the Biden administration. Our first step is to reactivate anti-fraud measures. This will ensure that all cabinet officials are vigilant and proactive in addressing any irregularities,” Vance explained.
Together with Andrew Ferguson, the task force’s vice chairman, and Stephen Miller, a top advisor at the White House, Vance highlighted the Minnesota fraud incident, which involved fraudulent autism service providers.
While the task force did not disclose specific policy changes, actions have already been taken, such as halting certain Medicaid payments to Minnesota due to eligibility issues, and suspending enrollment in the Medicare durable medical device program amid concerns of widespread fraud across states.
“This is not just theft of the American people’s money. This is also the theft of critical services that the American people rely on,” Vance said.
“The autism scam that we’ve seen in Somalian parts of Minnesota really illustrates well what’s been going on across whole layers of our government.”
Ferguson, who is also chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, called fraud an “existential” crisis and said “if we fail to address it, the fabric of our nation will swiftly unravel.”
“The American people feel like they are getting ripped off and they’re right,” he said.
Miller described the frustration of a hypothetical Minnesota lineman or construction worker who labors to earn a living.
“Imagine he has a neighbor who’s a Somali refugee who arrived two years ago and has a Mercedes and no financial stress, no worries at all in the entire world and who never seems to ever go to work at all because he just went to an office in the state, lied on a piece of paper and got limited free money forever for life,” Miller said.
“That is the system that is being run, that corruption that this task force for the leadership of the Vice President is going to demolish.”
Attendees of the meeting included HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, White House budget director Russ Vought, HUD secretary Scott Turner, Education Secretary Linda McMahon, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, SBA administrator Kelly Loeffler, VA secretary Doug Collins, and Department of Labor Inspector General Anthony D’Esposito.
“This is not business as usual. We are going on offense against fraud. We will track it, expose it, and shut it down,” D’Esposito said.
Colin McDonald, the recently confirmed new assistant attorney general for fraud, also attended.
