Establishing the Task Force To Eliminate Fraud

American taxpayers fund a vast benefits system for citizens in need that includes housing, food, medical care, cash assistance, and more. States administer these federally funded programs, and some States have embraced loopholes that avoid individual eligibility validation, allow self- certification of eligibility, and expand eligibility far beyond what the Congress intended. Worse, despite accepting Federal funds, some States have refused to institute basic fraud controls such as providing enrollee information to the Federal Government that would allow it to verify eligibility. As a result, illegal aliens, criminals, foreign gangs, bureaucrats, State and local officials, non-governmental organizations, and ineligible providers exploit these programs--which are intended to provide a safety net to lawfully eligible Americans--with ease. This exploitation and lack of controls to prevent it have resulted in widespread fraud, waste, and abuse at the expense of the American taxpayers who pay for and utilize these programs, contributing substantially to the national debt. Self-dealing political actors use such public benefits programs to solidify control over their communities and our political systems. Due to lax immigration policy and immigration fraud, certain public officials admit into our country, and provide sanctuary from Federal immigration laws to, migrant populations who are likely to rely on means-tested, public assistance programs (welfare) and increase the political support and power of the public officials providing the benefits. This increased support incentivizes public officials to maximize the flow of welfare to these communities and makes public officials who do so more powerful. Many of these public officials then fail to police these programs--and in some cases, willfully turn a blind eye to fraud, waste, and abuse within them--to ensure that welfare flows to these migrants. Due to insufficient election integrity measures, some migrants who are not eligible to vote do so anyway, with the same public officials permitting widespread ballot harvesting schemes that compromise our election integrity and help these public officials remain in power. The staggering fraud and waste in Minnesota alone is a case in point. Federal prosecutors in the State estimate that Medicaid fraud in recent years could total in the billions. Nearly 9 percent of the roughly $866 million spent on food stamps in Minnesota each year is estimated to be spent in error. The non-profit Feeding our Future engineered a scam that stole nearly $250 million intended to feed needy children in Minnesota by opening fake meal sites and submitting fraudulent claims for millions of meals that were never served. One of the defendants in this scam was also charged with submitting false claims to an autism services program that was subject to widespread fraud. Hundreds of millions of dollars in Federal childcare funding to Minnesota were stolen by an organized ring of Somali immigrants and others who used the stolen money to purchase cars, property, and luxury travel, and sent the funds overseas. The Federal Government is investigating allegations that some of the United States taxpayer dollars subject to fraud in Minnesota were even funneled to one of Africa's most heinous terror groups. All of this was ignored or undetected by State officials. There is also strong reason to believe that similar problems [[Page 13486]] exist in other States, including California, Illinois, New York, Maine, and Colorado. In fact, Minnesota and 20 other States filed a lawsuit to block the Federal Government from even conducting a basic review to determine whether their enrollees are in fact eligible for taxpayer-funded benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Such extensive, undetected fraud could only exist in a system that ignores it. Fraud and mismanagement in these programs constitutes theft of the hard-earned tax dollars from Americans paying into these programs, and of the benefits owed to Americans who need them. The failure to ensure sufficient Federal oversight to prevent fraud, waste, and abuse has allowed irresponsible State politicians to increase Federal spending in their own States, which has contributed to inflation for health care services, housing, utilities, and groceries. Making matters worse, the previous administration adopted policies that weakened the Federal Government's oversight of State administration and distribution of Federal funds under these programs, including by reducing commonsense verification measures, expanding access without adequate controls, tolerating unacceptable error rates, creating conditions in which fraud was institutionally tolerated and therefore flourished, and enabling individuals with substantial means to improperly access benefits. My Administration will use all available resources and authorities to fight fraud, close loopholes, enforce eligibility rules, and protect benefits for eligible Americans, while ensuring States administering Federal benefits programs do the same.

(a) There is hereby established within the Executive Office of the President a Task Force to Eliminate Fraud (Task Force). (b) The Vice President of the United States shall serve as the Chairman of the Task Force. The Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission shall serve as Vice Chairman of the Task Force, shall preside over the Task Force at the direction of the Chairman or in his absence, and shall exercise all powers of the Chairman herein defined at his direction or in his absence. The Chairman shall designate an Executive Director, who shall administer and execute the day-to-day operations of the Task Force, and who shall report to the Vice Chairman. The Assistant to the President for Homeland Security shall serve as the Senior Advisor to the Task Force. (c) In addition to the Chairman, the Vice Chairman, and the Senior Advisor, the Task Force shall include appropriate representatives from the following executive departments and agencies (agencies), or components: (i) the Department of the Treasury; (ii) the Department of Justice; (iii) the Department of Agriculture; (iv) the Department of Labor; (v) the Department of Health and Human Services; (vi) the Department of Housing and Urban Development; (vii) the Department of Education; (viii) the Department of Veterans Affairs; (ix) the Department of Homeland Security; (x) the Small Business Administration; (xi) the Office of Management and Budget; and (xii) other agencies, inspectors general, or components within the Executive Office of the President, as determined by the Chairman. (d) The Chairman or the Vice Chairman shall convene regular meetings of the Task Force, determine its agenda, and direct its work, consistent with this order. The Executive Director shall assist in the performance [[Page 13487]] of these duties. The Chairman may designate any member of the Task Force to preside over meetings of the Task Force in the absence of the Vice Chairman. (e) The Task Force shall coordinate with the Homeland Security Council on any matters related to law enforcement, public safety, national security, transnational crime, and organized criminal activity.

(a) The Task Force shall, on behalf of the President, coordinate and accelerate a comprehensive national strategy to stop fraud, waste, and abuse within Federal benefit programs, including programs administered jointly with State, local, tribal, and territorial partners. The Task Force shall advise the President and, on behalf of the President, shall coordinate the work of appropriate member agencies to: (i) develop measures to improve eligibility verification processes in Federal benefits programs and maximize enforcement of eligibility requirements, including program-specific requirements and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996; (ii) develop appropriate controls that operate before funds are obligated or disbursed to prevent improper payments in Federal benefits programs, including by coordinating agency action to determine when ongoing fraud or potential fraud require proactively pausing certain types of funding until such controls can be established; (iii) evaluate indicators of fraud and high-risk vulnerabilities to fraud, including major fraud trends and cross-program and large-scale schemes, which shall include considering the current and potential use by member agencies of third-party contractors to maximize efficacy in detecting fraud; (iv) promote the facilitation of information and data sharing and coordination between State, local, tribal, and territorial governments and the Federal Government, and benefit-providing agencies and law enforcement agencies; (v) disrupt and dismantle fraud networks and facilitators, including providers, contractors, or other entities and repeat cross-program offenders through interagency information sharing and coordination; (vi) investigate and disrupt the mechanisms through which fraud is committed, including any mechanisms involving facilitation of fraud by Federal, State, local, tribal, or territorial officials; (vii) prevent remittance transfers that involve the proceeds of Federal benefits fraud, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law; (viii) audit and ensure prospective compliance monitoring, including for use in identifying fraud in Federal benefits programs; and (ix) analyze identifying information for all providers or retailers associated with redemption of benefits to inspect for fraud and develop a process by which member agencies recommend policies for wide-scale revalidations or reauthorization to deter fraudulent providers, as appropriate and to the extent consistent with applicable law. (b) Each agency administering Federal benefit programs shall, consistent with applicable law, provide to the Task Force information concerning such programs that the Task Force deems relevant to advising the President and coordinating efforts to uncover benefits fraud and increase fraud-detection capability. (c) The Task Force shall be subject to the President's direct supervision and control. The Task Force, through the Chairman, shall provide frequent updates to the President regarding its work and shall ensure that its actions are consistent with the President's directions.

(a) Each agency administering Federal benefit programs represented on the Task Force shall identify the agency's benefit transactions and processes that are most susceptible to fraud schemes, which may include new enrollments, redeterminations, provider enrollments, eligibility self-attestation procedures, changes [[Page 13488]] to payment destinations or payees, or transactions involving third party intermediaries. Within 30 days of the date of this order, each such agency shall submit to the Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Task Force descriptions of such transactions and processes and suggested measures to prevent such fraud. (b) Within 60 days of the date of this order, the Task Force shall coordinate member agency efforts to adopt, as appropriate, minimum anti-fraud requirements for transactions and processes identified under subsection (a) of this section to prevent fraud and loopholes that allow for systemic abuse and exploitation. If such transactions and processes involving Federal funding are administered by a State, local, territorial, or tribal jurisdiction, then the Task Force and appropriate member agencies shall address how such jurisdictions can demonstrate implementation of the anti-fraud requirements. The Task Force and its member agencies also shall examine and recommend, as appropriate, any ways that Federal funds may be withheld from jurisdictions that do not have adequate anti-fraud requirements. Specifically, such anti-fraud requirements may include: (i) screening, proof of identity, and eligibility verification; (ii) pre-payment integrity and risk controls, including affirmative documentation requirements concerning services provided; (iii) information- and data-sharing processes, updated criteria, minimum integrity checks, cross-program risk indicators, and coordinated recovery and enforcement pathways to prevent immigration sponsor and beneficiary and household-related related fraud, abuse, or improper usage; (iv) appropriate use of providers, vendors, contractors, nonprofit organizations, intermediaries, and service organizations; and (v) audit and remedial measures, including suspension, termination, repayment, exclusion, and debarment actions, as appropriate. (c) Within 90 days of the date of this order, each member of the Task Force shall submit to the Chairman and the Vice Chairman of the Task Force a measurable implementation plan concerning the measures identified or developed under this order.

The heads of other agencies shall, upon the request of the Chairman or the Vice Chairman, provide administrative and technical support, or information required by the Task Force to carry out its functions.

The Attorney General shall: (a) take appropriate action to promote the meritorious pursuit by private persons of civil actions under 31 U.S.C. 3730 concerning fraud within Federal benefit programs; and (b) ensure prompt review of such actions, including within the 60-day period contemplated by 31 U.S.C. 3730(a)(4) to the maximum extent practicable.