The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) led by tech billionaire Elon Musk says it has discovered hundreds of millions of dollars worth of fraudulent unemployment insurance claims since 2020 that included payments to toddlers between the ages of one and five, people as old as 115-years-old and even people with birth dates 15 years into the future.
In a post, published to the DOGE X account on April 9, it says that since 2020, 24,500 people over the age of 115-years old claimed $59 million in benefits while 28,000 people between the ages of one and five claimed a staggering $254 million in benefits.
Even odder, the post says 9,700 people “with birth dates over 15 years in the future claimed $69M in benefits.”
“Your tax dollars were going to pay fraudulent unemployment claims for fake people born in the future!” Musk posted to X, adding, “This is so crazy that I had to read it several times before it sank in.”
In another post, Musk concluded, “The oldest living American is 114 years old, so it is safe to say that anyone 115 or older is collecting ‘unemployment’ due to being dead.”
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“There was no sanity check for impossibly young or impossibly old people for unemployment insurance,” Musk wrote.
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The debate rages on
On X, users chimed in with many praising DOGE’s efforts while others remained skeptical.
“Okay but I mean you’re talking less than $500 million? You know that’s like 3 minutes of federal government spending, right?” commented one user.
Another wrote, “I’m not buying it. Only since 2020? That doesn’t make sense. Plus to collect unemployment you have to go into the office with ID to collect unemployment. You don’t get unemployment forever and you have to be actively looking for a job while on unemployment.”
Some saw it differently, with one user posting, “My quick calculations say this alone is $382 million. For anyone that tries to justify this as input error, are we excusing that these errors had to have happened at least 62,200 times? That is a failure to safeguard taxpayer funds.”
“I find it hard to believe there wasn’t at least one person aware of this happening at this scale that could have stopped it,” the user concluded.
Others were adamant that no matter the amount of money involved, it is still alleged fraud and an abuse of taxpayer funds that needs to be investigated.
In a statement, Department of Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer said, “This is another incredible discovery by the DOGE team, finding nearly $400 million in fraudulent unemployment payments.”
She insisted that the department is committed to recovering the funds.
“We will catch these thieves and keep working to root out egregious fraud; accountability is here.”
