July monthly column: The rot taking root in our country
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Sen. Tommy Tuberville
Monthly column
By Sen. Tommy Tuberville
In the last two years, an unimaginable amount of fraud has been uncovered all over the United States. This issue came to light last year when Nick Shirley, an independent journalist, single-handedly exposed MASSIVE fraud in the child care system in Minnesota when he showed up at one of the Somali-run, taxpayer-funded daycare facilities only to find it closed in the middle of the day.
His work set off alarms across the country. Further investigations revealed that there have been more than $300 million taxpayer dollars stolen by Somalis in Minnesota through various fraud schemes. It’s disgusting and beyond unacceptable.
Unfortunately, the fraud isn’t confined to Minnesota. From Maine to California, we have discovered that just about every government-funded program has cheated hardworking Americans for years.
Every April, millions of Americans file their tax returns. No one likes to pay taxes, but we do it to support public resources that make our lives better like schools, police and roads.
Imagine discovering that your hard-earned money is not going towards these critical services, but instead funding fake Somali daycares in Minnesota, phony medical claims in Maine and bogus real estate loans in California. I know it sounds like a joke, but it’s not. This rot runs deep in the roots of our country – it is taking serious digging to unearth how far down it goes.
Earlier this year, Vice President Vance announced he would spearhead the monumental effort of rooting out the waste, fraud and abuse within taxpayer-funded systems across our country. Sadly, Americans who need assistance are being turned away because of bad actors who have gotten away with their crimes for years with no consequences.
It isn’t just our vice president who is focused on this – it’s a team effort. I have been encouraged by Secretary of Agriculture Rollins’ efforts to clean up SNAP, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kennedy’s efforts to end false claims in Medicare and Medicaid and Secretary of Treasury Bessent’s efforts to drop fraudulent Social Security payments.
After the failed leadership of Gov. Tim Walz was put on display in Minnesota, my first thought was the potential implications this kind of disaster could have on the future of this country. That’s why Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH) and I created a task force through the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee to clean up the fraud and abuse in the U.S. education system.
Taxpayer dollars are being wasted on fake daycares. Federal student loans are funding illegals and fraudsters pretending to be students instead of going to the students who need the loans.
Take it from me, someone who spent 40 years in schools and universities, our young people are the most precious resource we have. If we want to continue to prosper as a country, we have to make sure our education system is safe from third-world fraudsters who want nothing more than to destroy this country.
Beyond education, I also joined the Anti-Fraud Task Force with Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) to clean up fraud throughout the U.S. government. This group seeks to serve as a government watchdog to increase transparency when it comes to when and where federal funds are directed.
Just last week, the task force initiated a partnership with the Department of Justice to leverage congressional authorities in an effort to reinforce the agency’s anti-fraud initiatives. Reassuring Americans that their taxpayer dollars are not being wasted or stolen is the least Congress can do. And frankly, after what the task force has found, I wouldn’t trust a bureaucrat with my tax dollars if my life depended on it.
I’m encouraged by the work we’ve done thus far. Instead of throwing our hands up and being defeated, this administration and Congress are taking action to say enough is enough.
We’re facing a national crisis. Our national debt is through the roof, and wasting taxpayer dollars is doing nothing but digging us into an even deeper hole than the one we’re already in.
Hopefully, all of these endeavors will put more money back in the pockets of the American taxpayer – where it belongs. It’s past time we crack down on fraud and make sure the government is accountable to the American taxpayer again.