Commentary: Feds Set Record for Improper Payments

Government Spending

In 2021, near the peak of the coronavirus pandemic, investigators tailed a Jeep Cherokee stolen from an airport Avis to a New York City apartment they called a “fraud factory” – no furniture, just an air mattress, a computer, stacks of loan and tax forms, and a shredder. 

Two men who had first met in prison – Adedayo Ilori, 43, and Chris Recamier, 59 – were using stolen identities and fake paperwork to falsely claim they employed 200 people, bilking the federal government’s pandemic-relief programs of more than $1 million, according to federal prosecutors. They used the stolen money to splurge on big-ticket purchases, such as cryptocurrency, leasing luxury apartments and a Mercedes, the evidence showed.

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Commentary: An Economy That Serves Nobody Except Those in Charge

Suits

As we outlined in Part One, here in California, we have an economy that would be the fifth largest in the world if it were to be separated as a standing nation. Home to Silicon Valley, Hollywood, world-class agriculture, and medical schools, California is an economic powerhouse.

Yet we, in California, have the highest poverty rate in the nation. We have a majority of the nation’s homeless people. We have the highest overall tax rates in the nation. Our energy costs are double that of the national average. Our per-student spending in schools is well above the national average, yet our students consistently have below-average grade-level test scores. Our major cities are crime-ridden, our power grid is woefully vulnerable, and our beaches are regularly closed due to raw sewage contamination.

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Under Walz, Minnesota Bilked Hundreds of Millions Even After Warnings About ‘Pervasive’ Failures

Gov. Tim Walz

As his administration ramped up its government giveaways in the midst of a pandemic and border crisis, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz was warned his team did not have adequate protections for the taxpayer money it was sending out the door to nonprofit groups and workers.

In fact, auditors just last February reported they found “pervasive noncompliance” inside the Walz administration with grant management policies that were “signaling systemic issues regarding grants oversight.”

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