COVID-19 Relief Fraud by the Numbers; The Great Grift: How Billions in COVID-19 Relief Aid was Stolen or Wasted, and other C-Virus related stories

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COVID-19 relief fraud by the numbers:

President Joe Biden ended the Covid-19 national emergency this past April, a little more than three years after the pandemic began. While the disease may no longer be an everyday crisis, the pandemic saw the emergence of a new problem: efforts by fraudsters to steal Covid-19 relief funds from the government.

While fraud schemes surrounding Covid have been well documented, a report from The Associated Press provided new figures that shed light on what the AP called "the greatest grift in U.S. history." In total, the outlet reported that $400 billion in Covid relief funds were stolen or lost, and that figure is "certain to grow as investigators dig deeper into thousands of potential schemes," the AP said.

The haphazard nature of the pandemic's early days, along with agency shortages and other problems, created an environment where "the grift was just way too easy," the AP reported. The government's relief funds represented a "sort of endless pot of money that anyonef could access," Dan Fruchter, the chief of the fraud and white-collar crime unit for the Eastern District of Washington's U.S. Attorney's office, told the outlet. "Folks kind of fooled themselves into thinking that it was a socially acceptable thing to do, even though it wasn't legal."

How much fraud has occurred? --->READ MORE HERE

The Great Grift: How billions in COVID-19 relief aid was stolen or wasted:

Much of the theft was brazen, even simple.

Fraudsters used the Social Security numbers of dead people and federal prisoners to get unemployment checks. Cheaters collected those benefits in multiple states. And federal loan applicants weren’t cross-checked against a Treasury Department database that would have raised red flags about sketchy borrowers.

Criminals and gangs grabbed the money. But so did a U.S. soldier in Georgia, the pastors of a defunct church in Texas, a former state lawmaker in Missouri and a roofing contractor in Montana.

All of it led to the greatest grift in U.S. history, with thieves plundering billions of dollars in federal COVID-19 relief aid intended to combat the worst pandemic in a century and to stabilize an economy in free fall.

An Associated Press analysis found that fraudsters potentially stole more than $280 billion in COVID-19 relief funding; another $123 billion was wasted or misspent. Combined, the loss represents 10% of the $4.2 trillion the U.S. government has so far disbursed in COVID relief aid.

That number is certain to grow as investigators dig deeper into thousands of potential schemes.

How could so much be stolen? Investigators and outside experts say the government, in seeking to quickly spend trillions in relief aid, conducted too little oversight during the pandemic’s early stages and instituted too few restrictions on applicants. In short, they say, the grift was just way too easy. --->READ MORE HERE

Follow links below to relevant/related stories and resources:

Investigation Finds $400 Billion Was Stolen Or Wasted In Covid Fraudsters’ ‘Great Grift’

Over $400 Billion in COVID Aid Was Stolen or Wasted

USA TODAY: Coronavirus Updates

WSJ: Coronavirus Live Updates

YAHOO NEWS: Coronavirus Live Updates

NEW YORK POST: Coronavirus The Latest

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