U.S. Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler announced Friday that the agency has suspended 111,620 California borrowers amid suspected fraudulent activity across SBA pandemic-era loan programs. In total, these borrowers received 118,489 Paycheck Protection Program and Economic Injury Disaster Loans totaling more than $8.6 billion.
Once again, the Trump SBA is taking decisive action to deliver accountability in a state whose unaccountable welfare policies have created a culture of fraud and abuse at the expense of law-abiding taxpayers and small business owners,” said SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler. “Today, we announced we have suspended nearly 112,000 borrowers tied to at least $9 billion in suspected fraud. This staggering number represents the most significant crackdown on those who defrauded pandemic programs, and it illuminates the scale of corruption that the Biden Administration tolerated for years. As we did in Minnesota, we are actively working with federal law enforcement to identify the criminals who defrauded American taxpayers, hold them to account, and recoup the stolen funds. As we continue our state-by-state work, our message is clear: pandemic-era fraudsters will not get a pass under this Administration.”
These actions follow the SBA’s recent suspension of 6,900 Minnesota borrowers associated with 7,900 potentially fraudulent PPP and EIDL loans worth approximately $400 million.
While this suspension shuts off the tap, we shouldn’t deceive ourselves into thinking that this money will be recouped or even that the businesses are anything more than addresses of convenience. The California Post discovered one address in San Diego where 14 businesses were registered in 2020 that received more than $2 million in PPP and EIDL loans.
One thing we’re seeing is that in predominantly Democrat jurisdictions, defrauding federal programs has taken on the status of a lifestyle. The people who participate are disproportionately illegal immigrants, and the money they scam from the federal government finds its way into bank accounts, terrorist groups, and kickbacks to the local Democrat political power structure.
Though much of the coverage of fraud has focused on the Somali community in Minnesota, California does not appear to be lagging when it comes to draining federal funds. When Dr. Mehmet Oz, director of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, visited Los Angeles, he reportedly found 42 fraudulent hospices in a four-block radius responsible for at least $3.5 billion in fraud. Oz stated that, similar to Minneapolis, the fraud was being run by Russian and Armenian mobsters. This led California Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom to file a civil rights complaint against Oz, accusing him of discrimination.
In a roundabout way, Minnesota’s Democrat governor, failed vice presidential candidate, and former high school football coach inadvertently did the country a favor: had fraud been kept to reasonable levels in Minnesota, he might now be Vice President Walz. The nation caught a break on that one.
