Free Republic

The majority of the 40 defendants federally prosecuted for their roles in Oregon SNAP fraud schemes are illegal immigrants, the US Attorney's Office for the District of Oregon confirmed to The Post Millennial. The schemes involved numerous organized interstate crime rings that have defrauded the federal government of more than $3 million since at least 2024. The fraudsters stole EBT card data, mainly through skimming devices, to procure SNAP-eligible goods and sell them on the black market for personal gain, according to court documents. At least 11 individuals have been indicted since last month, Oregon US Attorney Scott Bradford announced...

A Trump administration fraud task force has uncovered nearly $42 million in food stamp funds meant for needy families that were instead stolen to support criminal activities as well as the lavish lifestyle of a rapper with multiple arrests — including for repeatedly exposing himself to pee off his apartment balcony. Vice President JD Vance and members of the Departments of Justice and Agriculture held a press conference in Cincinnati Wednesday highlighting the cases involving more than 40 defendants operating schemes that bilked the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and related programs. “Two-hundred twenty thousand Americans could’ve eaten for the entire...

EXCLUSIVE: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has launched a nationwide operation targeting illegal immigrants accused of fraudulently obtaining benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), resulting in multiple arrests, Fox News has learned. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) confirmed the operation to Fox News, announcing several arrests of illegal immigrants accused of fraudulently receiving SNAP benefits. "Illegal aliens who have no right to be here in the first place are the last people who should be using SNAP benefits and other forms of welfare," Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said in a statement. "These programs are for...

🚨 JUST IN: Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D)'s former aide LaMar Cook, already facing cocaine trafficking and gun charges, has been ARRESTED by federal prosecutors for SNAP FRAUD PARTY OF FRAUD. He's also accused of wrongly taking $30K in VACATION time, and must pay it back! Earlier this year, he was caught using his taxpayer-funded EBT card at supermarkets right outside Walt Disney World. Prosecutors say he claimed ZERO income and less than $100 in the bank to collect $500 a month in food stamps. Records reportedly showed he actually had thousands in the bank, plus about $12,000 in lottery...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Administration (FNA) announced a sweeping crackdown on fraudulent SNAP retailers—bodegas, convenience stores, and grocery stores—across New York’s five boroughs. This investigation, dubbed Operation SNAP Back, included hundreds of undercover investigations leading to action against 170 retailers. “This is just the latest action in the Trump Administration's fight against fraud. The message is clear, if you accept any portion of an annual $100 billion taxpayer program, you must follow the rules or face the consequences,” said U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins. “We owe it to every American...

The FBI's Most Wanted Fraudsters initiative notched its fifth arrest in just three months after authorities in India arrested Manjit Singh Bedi Friday, and the bureau is working to return the alleged SNAP benefits fraud suspect to the United States, Fox News Digital has learned. The FBI worked with Indian authorities to secure Bedi's arrest and is actively working to return him to the U.S. to face charges, according to the bureau. Bedi's arrest is the fifth through the FBI's Most Wanted Fraudsters initiative, which targets fugitives accused of major financial crimes. Launched in June, the initiative has led to...

A Trump administration effort aimed at discouraging Americans on food stamps from using the government nutritional aid to buy soda is having an impact, a new study shows. Recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits cut their sugary drink purchases by more than 12% from January to June of this year after new state-level restrictions on what people can buy with food stamps took effect, according to a working paper released this week by economic and public health experts at the University of Chicago, MIT and Stanford University. That reduction in purchases is equivalent to a person buying 34 fewer...

(WJAR) — Rhode Island U.S. Attorney’s Office said a former Rhode Island Department of Human Services supervisor pleaded guilty in a scheme to defraud the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). According to federal prosecutors, 59-year-old Nadine Jean Baptiste used her position to improperly access and exploit the personal information and benefits of SNAP recipients. On Tuesday, officials said Jean Baptiste admitted to accessing SNAP EBT card information, conducting unauthorized telephone balance inquiries, and altering PINs associated with those cards. Those impacted by this scheme included juveniles, homeless individuals, or people that were incarcerated at the time their information was accessed,...

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Justice Department’s National Fraud Enforcement Division has uncovered roughly $350 million in alleged fraud across the Southeastern U.S., the Daily Caller has learned. The charges span seven states in 17 different cases and involve SNAP benefits, Small Business Administration loans, housing benefits and tax fraud, officials told the Caller. The DOJ is expected to announce the cases Thursday alongside state partners in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina and South Carolina, which helped uncover the fraud. Going forward, the seven states have agreed to data-sharing agreements with the division that will give the DOJ access...

WASHINGTON — Millions of parents refusing to pay child support may have their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) eligibility revoked after the US Department of Agriculture rescinded a Biden administration rule earlier this month, The Post has learned. The move, which revives a policy implemented during the first Trump administration, could save taxpayers billions of dollars per year in money that’s formerly gone to delinquent child support payees. “This is not about kicking people, who truly can’t afford to make payments, off SNAP,” said Alex Adams, assistant secretary for family support at the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration...

We went undercover inside smoke shops and bodegas across New York City to answer a simple question: Would retailers accept taxpayer-funded EBT benefits to pay for alcohol or drugs? Store after store attempted to process EBT cards for kratom, a psychoactive substance that is not eligible for purchase with SNAP or EBT benefits. One clerk attempted to process the purchase as “EBT Cash.” Another processed it as “EBT Food”, treating kratom as if it were groceries. Federal law 7 CFR 278 and 7 U.S.C 2012 prohibits retailers from accepting SNAP or EBT benefits for non-food items, including drugs, alcohol, and...

For sixty years, the food stamp program has operated under an arrangement no family and no business would ever accept: one level of government runs the program, and another level of government pays for it. States sign people up, calculate benefits, and process the paperwork while federal taxpayers cover the bill. When the people writing the checks and the people doing the work are in different buildings, nobody watches the register. The results are exactly what you’d expect. In fiscal year 2024, the federal government spent roughly $100 billion on SNAP, and at least $10.5 billion of it was lost...

Snap Chief Executive Evan Spiegel and his wife, supermodel Miranda Kerr, have helped pay off $550 million in medical debt for more than 261,000 Californians. The couple made a multimillion-dollar donation to Undue Medical Debt, a nonprofit that provides debt relief to people in financial need. The organization acquires medical debt in bulk from hospitals, physician groups, collection agencies and other groups for a fraction of the cost. "When someone you love is sick. All you want to do is focus on helping them get better," said Kerr, who is also the founder of skincare company KORA Organics, in a...

A nationwide welfare fraud crackdown reached Massachusetts this week, as federal authorities announced the arrests of 15 people — 11 of them illegal immigrants — accused of stealing more than $1.4 million in American taxpayer-funded benefits. The defendants are accused of fraudulently obtaining benefits through programs including Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food assistance, MassHealth, Social Security disability payments, housing assistance and unemployment benefits, according to the Department of Justice. "Alarmingly, 11 of the 15 charged defendants are suspected illegal aliens, some of whom assumed stolen identities to steal these taxpayer-funded benefits and avoid detection," Acting Assistant Attorney General Colin...

This report examines welfare use...for households headed by non-citizens...About half of non-citizens are illegal immigrants...Traditional welfare programs examined are TANF, SSI, SNAP, WIC, school meals, Medicaid, and public/subsidized housing...The non-citizen [welfare use] rate rises to 57 percent when eligibility for the EITC or ACTC [Tax Credits] is added, compared to 34 percent for the U.S.-born.

Agriculture's Andy Gipson says until recently, Mississippi’s SNAP error rate didn’t cause welfare bureaucrats much concern. But President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Act changed that. Just last week, the GAO estimated that improper welfare payments are costing state and federal taxpayers a staggering $186 billion a year – and as much as $3 trillion overall since 2003. It’s numbers like these that have inspired Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins to do everything she can to eliminate fraud from state Food Stamp programs. Thus far, Secretary Rollins’ efforts have led to the removal of millions of ineligible recipients. “A lot of...

A federal judge sided with Maryland and a coalition of Democratic-led states on Friday, halting the enforcement of new conditions on billions of dollars of federal food assistance under the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

As you are probably aware, in most circumstances and for most categories of handouts, illegal immigrants in the United States do not qualify for welfare benefits. As I’m using it here, the term “welfare” does not include Social Security or Medicare, which are not restricted by income status; but the term “welfare” does include all of the large number of what are called “means-tested” programs, which in the aggregate consume nearly $1 trillion annually of federal spending (and well over $1 trillion if state contributions are included). The biggest of the “means tested” programs are Medicaid, SNAP (“food stamps”), and...

Vice President J.D. Vance’s Task Force to Eliminate Fraud has taken a number of actions to tackle fraud in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in the months since its establishment. From Operation Cold SNAP, in which multiple government agencies coordinated to execute warrants on SNAP retailers in Minnesota, to the Office of the Inspector General’s (OIG) probe into millions of allegedly fraudulent payments to dead people in Puerto Rico, and indictments secured by the Department of Justice, the federal government has taken a variety of actions to root out fraud in the food assistance program. “Every day, the Trump...

In Lawrence, Massachusetts, a whistleblower revealed a welfare scam that the Dominican community has been running for over a decade. Here is how it works: Dominican immigrants buy food with EBT cards or take it for free from food banks. They then load it into shipping barrels and send it to the Dominican Republic, where it is sold for profit in local bodegas. We tracked the entire pipeline, from corner stores in Massachusetts to shipping hubs in New York to bodegas in Santo Domingo that are stocked with food paid for by the American taxpayer. We are prepared to share...