Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ) discussed Congress's plans to question Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D-MN) and AG Keith Ellison on the ongoing welfare fraud scandal in a recent appearance on Fox Business's Bottom Line, suggesting that welfare fraud is prevalent in other states, including Arizona.
Discussing Walz and Ellison, who are set to appear before Congress on February 10th, Rep. Biggs predicted, "I anticipate that at some point, they are going to start rolling the Fifth Amendment, aren't they? But the American people need to see this."
More importantly, he noted, "We are actually going to be able to take different types of remedial action, and that is why we have to get those guys in and see if they are going to talk."
When pressed by Bottom Line hosts Dagen McDowell and Brian Brenberg about remedial actions, Rep. Biggs answered, "What Congress should have always been doing is, number one, you start taking away federal money, and we have seen that the [Trump] administration is doing that now, but Congress needs to codify that and start removing that."
Additionally, the Arizona Congressman suggested that "you make sure that you have forensic— not just auditors, but you have, for instance, CPAs [certified public accountants] and criminal investigators going in to make sure of what they are doing."
Biggs stated that "you actually need to start closing down these programs and putting a period of time in place where the federal government is not going to be your copartner in fraud any longer, because it is not, unfortunately, just in Minnesota. We are looking at, right now, one program in Minnesota, and you are starting to see that it was going on in just bucketfuls of federal programs going on."
He cited a supposed study suggesting that Arizona's Medicaid program has been subject to $6 billion in possible fraud. While this number cannot currently be verified, Arizona saw a massive $2.5 billion Medicaid fraud scheme perpetrated between 2019 and 2023.
