President Biden’s plans for America are out of touch with the requirements of the nation’s social safety net because he advocates for spending more money without addressing the trillions of dollars in fraud and waste that is occurring, according to a member of Congress.
“We can’t fix the social safety net by making it bigger and expanding the government’s reach,” explained Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., the ranking member of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, in a commentary at Real Clear Politics.
“That’s like taking a leaky bucket and adding more water to it thinking the hole will fix itself. It’s unrealistic and irresponsible. Sadly, that’s President Biden’s plan,” he said.
He warned the nation is ‘hemorrhaging” money while on a “path toward becoming a welfare state fully entrenched in waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement.”
“President Biden plans to expand welfare to almost half of the country’s working adults through the deceptively named American Families Plan. If passed, it will allow the federal government to meddle in Americans’ everyday lives from birth to death. Meanwhile, every year, entitlement programs are spending tens of billions of taxpayer dollars improperly – either through inaccuracies, incompetence, or fraud,” he said.
“Government is already too big with too much waste. Current entitlement programs are rife with abuse. Their size and lack of guardrails to protect taxpayer dollars open the door for bad actors to take advantage of the system. But rather than acknowledging and addressing these issues, the Biden administration wants to dramatically expand the welfare state, which will undoubtedly result in even more waste, fraud, and abuse,” he said.
He cited reports from government agencies that estimate $1.9 trillion in “improper payments” since 2003.
But that might just be the tip of the iceberg, he said, because the GOA can’t even decide how many “improper payments” are made.
“In fiscal year 2020, more than 21% of Medicaid’s federal program spending was the result of improper spending, which means one-fifth of taxpayer dollars, intended to help roughly 77 million low-income and medically needy individuals, has been lost without helping those Americans. Medicare was similarly disastrous, with $43 billion in improper payments—money that should have helped provide health care for the 63 million elderly and disabled currently receiving Medicare benefits,” he said.
Further, the earned income tax credit, unemployment insurance, and supplemental security income add many more billions in improper payments, he said.
These totals don’t even included the fraud and mismanagement of the “COVID-19 relief programs,” he said.
He said he’s called on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “to provide a breakdown of all state specific Medicaid improper payments from 2015 to 2020. This will provide a better picture of the types and amounts of improper payments. These details will help us eliminate incentives for fraud and reduce waste.”
But Biden, he said, is “planning to expand existing entitlement programs and create new ones. He is doing so knowing the federal government is incapable of tracking the waste in existing programs, opening the door for more abuse. Why? Because he and the Democrats are anxious to reshape America. To make Americans dependent on the government rather than encourage self-reliance and promote the American dream. ”
Instead of some socialist utopia, he warned, “America will deteriorate into a socialist welfare state, constantly on the edge of fiscal collapse and where the American dream will no longer be a reality.”
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