On Monday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order officially launching the Fraud Task Force. Trump first announced this initiative in his February State of the Union address to combat fraud within the systems of the federal government benefit programs that overlap with the 50 states, most notably, the Medicaid services that have been abused in cities like Minneapolis and California.
From the Executive Order:
Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order creating the Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, which will advise the President and coordinate government-wide efforts to combat widespread fraud, waste, and abuse in Federal benefit programs.
The Vice President will serve as Chair of the Task Force, the Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission will serve as Vice Chairman, the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security will serve as Senior Advisor, and an Executive Director will manage daily operations. Relevant cabinet secretaries and heads of government agencies will serve as Task Force members.
The Order directs the Task Force, on behalf of the President, to coordinate a comprehensive national strategy to stop fraud, waste, and abuse across Federal benefit programs, including housing, food, medical care, and cash assistance administered with State and local partners, in order to protect these benefits for eligible Americans.
Read More: State Auditors Uncover $5.7 Billion in Fraud and Waste Across 28 States
$1 Million to $343 Million: Minnesota’s Autism Spending Explosion Demands Answers
The president was surrounded by Vice President JD Vance, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairman Andrew Ferguson, Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, and other staffers and press in the Oval Office. Trump declared, “This is a very big thing we’re doing,” then asked White House Staff Secretary Will Scharf to describe the executive order and its aims.
“Mr. President, as you stated in your State of the Union address, in light of widespread revelations of fraud in federally-funded programs in states like Minnesota and California, this executive order in front of you will establish a new Task Force aimed at rooting out that fraud, returning potentially billions or tens of billions or even hundreds of billions to the American taxpayer. This Task Force will be chaired by the Vice President, the vice chairman will be the head of FTC Andrew Ferguson, whose with us here as well today. But this is going to launch a ‘whole of government approach’ to rooting out the very serious problem of fraud in federally-funded programs around the country.”
WATCH:
“This is a very big thing that we’re doing… having to do with all of the fraud that’s taking place in our country.”@POTUS prepares to sign an Executive Order establishing a @VP-led task force to root out fraud, as outlined in his State of the Union address. pic.twitter.com/5tSg93E1Io
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 16, 2026
Trump then introduced VP Vance, who elucidated how President Trump had already begun to tackle the fraud problem, starting in Minnesota.
“This is a very important whole of government approach to tackling the fraud problem. Let me just tell one story, one of the things that even before this executive order was signed that we were able to stop under the president’s leadership.
“We saw evidence, that in Minneapolis, there were Somalians, primarily illegal immigrants, who were defrauding a Medicaid program that was meant to go to autistic children. So, they were taking children who were supposed to get benefits, and they were claiming that their kids were actually autistic, even though they weren’t. And what did this mean? This meant two things. Number 1, you had a lot of people getting rich off of the fraud while the American citizens got poorer. And the second thing that it meant is that you had autistic kids, in Minneapolis, in suburban Minneapolis, who weren’t getting benefits they needed because Somali fraudsters were literally stealing out of their pocket. It’s got to stop, and unfortunately that kind of fraud is one example of probably hundreds just within the state of Minneapolis, and then it’s repeated and replayed all over the United States of America.”
Vance further explained that the reason a Task Force was needed is that fraud that had been discovered in one agency was rarely (if ever) communicated to another one.
“When we first started talking about this problem, the president made it very clear he wanted us to take the fraud problem seriously, because nobody had until he was president, we started to figure out one big hole that existed is that the agencies of government weren’t actually talking to each other. So, Treasury would have evidence of financial fraud, but wasn’t talking to the Department of Justice about it. Health and Human Services had evidence of Medicaid fraud, but wasn’t talking to the Department of the Treasury about it. So, what this executive order does is force the entire apparatus of the federal government to do two things: Stop the fraud of the American taxpayer and make sure that the benefits that ought by right go to American citizens, go to American citizens and not to fraudsters.”
Vance then introduced FTC Chair and vice chair of the Task Force, Andrew Ferguson. Vance jokingly said, “If you’re curious what’s the difference between the vice chair and the chair: the vice chair is going to do all the work, and I’m going to take all the credit.”
WATCH:
.@VP: “What this executive order does is force the entire apparatus of the federal government to do two things: stop the fraud of the American taxpayer, and make sure that the benefits that ought, by right, go to American citizens, go to American citizens, and not to fraudsters.” https://t.co/G8xIyQk9VV pic.twitter.com/OMumxv8coj
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 16, 2026
FTC Chair Ferguson delineated further why this was so important. American taxpayers paid into a system that they expected to be there for them when they needed it. Instead, they have discovered that this money, which should have been allotted for their needs, has been funneled into fraudulent businesses and propping up illegal aliens, instead of being used for American citizens.
Ferguson said:
“Millions and millions of Americans pay into these programs everyday, and they expect to get something out of it. And this fraud is just siphoning money that millions of Americans pay to fund their hospitals, to fund their day care centers, into completely fake businesses. It isn’t just unfair to all of us as taxpayers who pay for all this, it’s particularly unfair to the Americans who need this the most and watch this money leave their hospital, leave their school systems, and go out to fraud. And that is why this effort is so important.
“And I think, we’ve just begun really looking at this, but I think one of the things we’re going to find is that in a lot of these agencies, the previous administration was pretty lax about existing anti-fraud controls, and we’re going to expose that too.”
WATCH:
.@AFergusonFTC: “This fraud is just siphoning money that millions of Americans pay to fund their hospitals, to fund their daycare centers, into completely fake businesses. It isn’t just unfair to all of us, as taxpayers, who pay for all this, it’s particularly unfair to the… https://t.co/G8xIyQk9VV pic.twitter.com/pcn9ah9Fdq
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 16, 2026
As RedState reported, Minnesota, California, and Maine are at the forefront of states getting the deep dive from the Fraud Task Force. However, a state auditors’ report detailing $5.7 billion of waste, fraud, and abuse found across 28 states also cannot be ignored.
The State Financial Officers Foundation’s 2025 Oversight Report lays out what 40 state treasurers, auditors, and comptrollers say they uncovered after digging into eligibility systems, payment flows, and local government spending. The document puts numbers on the page.
The Oversight Report elevated Kentucky and North Carolina as in need of deeper scrutiny. But our next in line recommendations are: Illinois, Hawaii, and the ruby red states of Georgia and Alabama.
The Fraud Task Force, headed by VP Vance and FTC Chair Ferguson, will see it done.
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