Posted on 01/14/2017 9:48:03 PM PST by Olog-hai
Dead retailers redeemed more than $2 billion worth of food stamps, according to a new audit.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s inspector general reviewed billions of transactions through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps. It found that thousands of stores authorized to accept food stamps were using the Social Security numbers of deceased persons.
An audit released Thursday found instances of potential fraud where the Food and Nutrition Service issued food stamps through stores that claimed to be owned by children or the dead.
“We found that 3,394 authorized SNAP retailers (retailers) used Social Security Numbers (SSN) that matched SSNs of deceased people,” the inspector general said. “Additionally, 193 retailers listed owners who were not at least 18 years of age. While FNS did have some controls to edit or verify SNAP retail owner information, these controls were not adequate to ensure owner information accuracy.” …
(Excerpt) Read more at freebeacon.com ...
Potential $2 billion hit to the gov’t economic figures.
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Get rid of the SNAP and EBT cards and instead hand out powdered milk, bags of beans, cans of Spam and TVP, and surplus cheese to the needy at the welfare offices.
We would save hundreds of billions of dollars and the genuinely poor would still get fed.
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Please define ‘needy’ and ‘poor’. There’s the rub, no?
Do the ‘needy’ pop-out need brood every 9-mo? Do they buy the latest\greatest electronics\vehicles\etc.? Do they still have A/C, cable, internet, WiFi, phone, etc.?
How ‘bout the ‘poor’? How ‘bout those whom live off savings\under-the-table (never get a ‘pay check’)...along with the points above?
Sorry, but we either HAVE a Constitution, and (some of) the Rights it affirms (5th and 13th specifically), or we are discussing a moot point (being serfs\chattel).
Govt has to ability, no authority, to define ‘charity’, let alone ‘gift’ to those it deems worthy; never a $$ it has that wasn’t taken from another.
Fraud BY and OF govt gets rectified....BY (more) govt? P-L-E-A-S-E.
“Stealing is a SNAP!”
This is awesome!
But not only is it wrong, it’s a slippery slope to NO scruples or morals.
Might have acted differently 20 years ago.
This IS exactly the program for ‘food benefits’ in Calif.
ok. thanx for painting the picture.
I can see how that would put the drug dealers in the retailers slot.
complete with bogus IDs.
thanx
Yes, that works better!
Life.
The obvious question is, why would retailers need to use bogus SS#s?
One possible answer: illegal aliens are buying American property and starting businesses because they’ve become so comfortably assured that they won’t be deported.
Another possible answer: some “retailers” don’t actually own brick-and-mortar stores with physical addresses, and they aren’t really selling groceries. They’re conducting back room fraud operations, using card swiping / barcode scanning technology to produce bogus receipts, which are then submitted to collect the cash.
The cash is electronically deposited into a corporate bank account tied to a bogus identity, and eventually laundered to an offshore account.
Wouldn’t it be funny if a few Congresscritters were involved.
The auditors are finally catching on, to what the folks in da hood have known, like, for evah.
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