Massachusetts Auditor Discovers Almost $12 Million in Public Assistance Fraud in 2025
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) had the most fraud, totaling over $1.4 million.
I hope this gains as much national traction as the Minnesota fraud schemes.
The Massachusetts Bureau of Special Investigations identified nearly $12 million in public assistance fraud from July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2025.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) had the highest level of fraud, totaling over $1.4 million. MassHealth came in second at $1.3 million.
“For countless residents across the Commonwealth, these programs offer access to everyday items they need, including food and medical services,” said State Auditor Diana DiZoglio. “Through the work of our fraud examiners, we continue to help ensure they operate with transparency, accountability, and equity. Our team will continue to work to ensure taxpayer dollars are used effectively and that resources are available to those who truly need and qualify for them.”
I imagine the fraud results will be higher for Fiscal Year 2026.
In December, prosecutors charged two Haitian men with allegedly running a $7 million SNAP benefits scam.
Antonis Bonheur, 74, is a naturalized U.S. citizen from Haiti, and owner of the Jesula Variety Store (JVS) in Mattapan, MA, located about 7.5 miles south of Boston.
Saul Alisme, 24, is a lawful permanent resident, but still a citizen of Haiti. He owns the Saul Mache Mixe Store (SMM), which has only been SNAP-authorized since February 2025.
JVS allegedly trafficked over $6 million in SNAP benefits over three years. SMM allegedly trafficked over $121,890 in benefits since May of 2025.
They also allegedly stole and sold food meant for the nonprofit organization Feed My Starving Children.
On Tuesday, federal prosecutors charged four Massachusetts residents, including two Venezuelans, for allegedly stealing over 100 identities to retrieve over $1 million in food stamps and pandemic-era unemployment benefits:
U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts Leah Foley said stolen identities from Connecticut, Florida, Kentucky, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Puerto Rico were used to obtain $440,000 in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits from Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
The defendants also allegedly submitted fraudulent documents in order to receive more than $700,000 in Pandemic Unemployment Assistance from Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Washington and Nevada.
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Looking at the data in the link there was one new referral to the Auditor from Law Enforcement in the 12 month period reflected in the report.
All these govt programs are vulnerable to rampant fraud primarily b/c they were designed for a high trust society where social stigma and reputation damage served as an effective deterrent. Those sorts of honor system dynamics are no longer relevant in our degraded modern culture. The other issue is public indifference and cynicism to fraud. Many have the same attitude towards private Insurance…. ‘oh someone intentionally wrecked your car…well you have insurance’. Audits ain’t sexy, fraud prevention is boring. Either we demand strict adherence to increased program controls to establish and maintain eligibility with proactive audits/reviews by State/Federal investigators, compliance reviews for vendors/program participants and outside audits for the agencies who are supposed to monitor/administer these programs or these programs will end…. whether through eventual public outrage demanding reform or by collapsing under the weight of their own fraudulent payments. Kick the can down the road only works where there’s more road.
I disagree about being designed for a high trust society. They’re ripe with fraud (and BIG fraud) because they were designed to buy votes and to nationalize and weaponize compassion. The high trust bit (particularly trust in government) just enabled it go on unobserved.
I don’t disagree about the aspects of vote buying and weaponized compassion to grow Federal spending (and the Federal bureaucracy, the intrusive powers of the Federal government and of course the ‘need’ for increased Federal revenue aka taxes to support those things). I would point out that those are not mutually exclusive with their establishment in an era of high trust that our society no longer exists.
A big part of the ‘high trust’ society’s vulnerability is the naivete, gullibility and the refusal to believe ‘people’ would take advantage. That’s the basis for almost every fraud, confidence scheme, scam. The folks who blindly support these programs while simultaneously opposing basic common sense anti fraud measures are the same sort of folks who fall prey to ‘your CPU has a virus and I need your PW to solve/fix it’ sorts of scams. Heck the Nigerian Prince scam still works. See the Tinder Swindler for modern scams that operate in similar fashion.
In MN they allow a process called ‘vouching’ where a supposedly honest verified voter can ‘vouch’ for the address (and thus eligibility) for up to 8 other people. SD allows ‘self vouching’ by simply signing an affidavit at the polls. Iowa allows a verified registered voter to vouch for the Identity of someone who ‘forgot’ to bring their ID to the polling place. That sort of thing might have been ok in the Norman Rockwell era but that isn’t acceptable in modern, low trust society b/c we KNOW these honor system schemes WILL be abused.
“A big part of the ‘high trust’ society’s vulnerability is the naivete, gullibility and the refusal to believe ‘people’ would take advantage. That’s the basis for almost every fraud, confidence scheme, scam.”
Most egregiously, the “let’s succor all the endangered refugees” scam that got us into this mess in the first place.
Massachusetts $12m fraud
Minnesota fraud $1b
Gov Gavin (d) – “Rookies”
Many states solve the “uninsured motorist” problem by requiring honest people to purchase insurance for collisions with “uninsured motorists”.
Keep looking. “we continue to help ensure they operate with transparency, accountability, and equity.” Watch that last word as it may be a way for the speaker to keep her job while she searches for fraud.
$12 million in a whole year? In Massachusetts? The auditors weren’t looking very hard. Maybe $12 million is just the thieves who didn’t give the auditors a cut to look the other way.
I suspect MA has at least that much fraud every week.
“You gotta pump those numbers up! Those are rookie numbers!”
You can fit the entire Republican delegation on Beacon Hill into a intercity bus (30 people).
The Commonwealth is the very epitome of the blue state model. The fact that the governor is a liberal lesbian is not an accident – it’s deliberate. Those who live in Massachusetts are more fairly called subjects than citizens. Taxation and regulation are high; the recipients of this largess are neither producers or citizens.
The fraud isn’t measured in the millions. You’ll have to use the “B” word to begin getting your arms around the issue.
I left for Florida, like many others. Massachusetts is a lost cause.
I’m moving to NH in a few weeks.
I can’t retire here. I was born and raised in MA. I’ve always loved this part of the country, but I hate the politics. The “Hackarama,” as Howie Carr calls it….
If you’ve already made the psychic investment to move, now’s not the time to cheap out. Moving to the land of Sununu is like moving to a different tree when the rainstorm has soaked the one you’re under. Don’t waste the opportunity to get what you really want., this particular one comes so few times in a person’s life.
How did people eat before food stamps? We have never had a mass famine in the U.S. A variety of answers. They worked and earned money to feed themselves. Why work if the government will feed you for doing nothing? Private charities also fed people. How is it that people on food stamps can send money abroad in the form of remittances? Mexico alone gets over $70 billion in remittances. If these programs didn’t exist we wouldn’t have cheating. There’s the fundamental answer to the problem of fraud. Abolish the programs. If a state wants these giveaways, then do it on. your own dime. Then people will either move away or vote out the politicians who love to spend other people’s money.
They have been fighting this audit for years. Now we know why. But we always knew.
New rule: if you want benefits, you show up in person with ID, and the person disbursing the money is responsible; fraudulent payments come out of their paychecks. If you want your money, show up.
Sounds low by an order of magnitude or two.
It’s probable we’ll find a shocking, but unsurprising, level of fraud sucking our national wealth dry as the investigations continue.
OT: Has anybody else noticed that the LI website is sometimes a little slow to respond? I’ve noticed it on Brave and Firefox.
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No doubt as the investigations move Nationwide that’s what will be discovered.
$12 million? That’s rounding error in Massachusetts. That’s about a third of Beacon Hill’s annual budget for office coffee.
the culture of the dnc is fraud
and they are proud of that fact
Fraud is how they survivre
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) had the most fraud, totaling over $1.4 million.
So, that means there are at least 11 programs? ELEVEN programs of “public assistance”? That would seem to suggest a solution even before you audit out the fraud. Eliminate most of those programs.
And, yeah, that’s just in 2025.
Another blue state, another financial fraud.. Sadly, the Minnesota numbers make the rest of the states’ numbers look reasonable.
You have a typo at the top: Third graph, the SNAP is stated at 1.4mil, according to the graphic it should be 4.1mil.
You might want to wait for the same sort of investigations and discovery to take place in CA, Illinois and NY. The CMS just released data showing one County in CA (LA) had 18% of the total Federal spending on Hospice care.
If that’s all they discovered in a year they weren’t looking.
Most likely they just picked a couple that didn’t give the Democrats their cut in ‘campaign contributions’ so made an example of them.
She’s still going through everything. The legislature and the judiciary are fighting her tooth and nail.
I hear Karen Spilka stole her white cane, just to slow her down.
Oh! Somebody did 15 minutes of work in a year! Sounds like fraud at the auditor’s office. That would be no surprise, since all of the government in MA is involved in fraud. I personally uncovered fraud at the MA Dept. of Revenue. Imagine the fraud if the state tax system is filled with scammers. I am currently working through fraud at the commission that implements the grant program at the new MBTA zoning overlay. Such a surprise.
A real audit would find about $1M per minute. Heck, I personally know people that have committed more tax fraud in MA than the whole year’s investigation found.
Fraud in MA is in the multi-billion range, say 20% of the $63B state budget. Perhaps as high as 50%.
Mattapan is part of the City of Boston. Mattapan is the Algonquian name for “a good place to be” or “a good place to sit because of its location on the Neponset River which forms the southern border of the City of Boston. Mattapan borders Milton to the south and is adjacent to Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood to the east.
Somalians? Or just plain rotten Democrats?
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