Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ) is demanding answers from California Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA) as a massive hospice care fraud scandal is being unveiled in his state.
In a letter to Gov. Newsom, Rep. Biggs detailed just how rampant the hospice fraud allegedly is: Not only are there reportedly six times the national average number of hospice agencies in Los Angeles County alone relative to the senior population, but the number of agencies has unrealistically skyrocketed 1500% since 2010 (500 were located in a 3-mile radius alone).
That means the number of California hospice providers is 33 times that of Florida and 36 times that of the 36 states combined.
California auditors estimate that these hospice providers were allegedly overbilling Medicare by $105 million per year, spending an average of $29,000 per "patient," with some providers charging $74,000 per "patient."
In fact, 18 of these fake hospice providers were billed under a single doctor's name, raking in $600 million across 76,000 claims between 2021 and 2024, a third of which, $210 million, was in 2024 alone.
And what did Gov. Newsom do when Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Director Dr. Mehmet Oz pointed all of this out?
The California governor filed a civil rights complaint, calling the fraud allegations "baseless and racist."
"American taxpayers work extremely hard for their money, yet government agencies across America allow rampant misuse and abuse of these funds at alarming rates," said Rep. Biggs in a statement. "Under Governor Newsom's purview, rogue operators and organizations have exploited taxpayers for years with no end in sight. If California won't end this dereliction of duty by state officials, then Congress will step in to protect unsuspecting men and women. We will not tolerate this shameless disregard of the duty of government to responsibly steward taxpayer dollars."
The Arizona congressman explicitly compared the hospice fraud to the welfare fraud found in Minnesota, for which he chaired a House Crime and Federal Government Surveillance Subcommittee hearing in late January.
