STOLEN FUNDS

Watchdog Finds Scammers Stole Billions in Pandemic Aid

The new report casts blame on Trump, Biden and federal lawmakers for failing to stem the flow of the theft.

COVID relief fraudsters stole up to $135 billion in pandemic aid, according to a report released Tuesday by the Government Accountability Office. That means thieves took roughly $1 out of every $7 earmarked for jobless Americans, The Washington Post reports. The GAO concluded that the Trump administration, the Biden administration and federal lawmakers had all failed to close the loopholes that enabled the thieves. The fraud began after Congress approved a historic aid package at the start of the pandemic. Scammers impersonated unemployed people, prisoners and even the dead, in order to get access to the relief money, the Post reports. The Justice Department has been cracking down, announcing last month it had investigated and charged cases related to $8.6 billion in stolen aid.