The United States will begin aggressively targeting COVID-19 fraud, with the government appointing a prosecutor tasked with pursuing misconduct related to coronavirus relief funds.
The Justice Department announced Kevin Chambers would take the reins as the director for COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement and oversee strike teams tasked with hunting down fraudsters who illegally procured pandemic relief funds.
“Our Strike Teams will enhance the department’s existing efforts and will include analysts and data scientists to review data, agents to investigate the cases, and prosecutors and trial attorneys to bring charges and try the cases,” Chambers said.
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Chambers currently works as the associate deputy attorney general in the Justice Department. He plans to focus on “large-scale criminal enterprises and foreign actors” who committed fraud. He will oversee multiple strike teams that will analyze specific components of the colossal pandemic aid. The efforts will include both criminal and civil enforcement actions.
As of Thursday, the Justice Department says it has unearthed over $8 billion in pandemic relief fraud and is pursuing cases against the alleged perpetrators in court. Congress authorized over $5 trillion in funding to ease the economic fallout from the pandemic. This included loans for businesses, COVID-19 healthcare fraud, bolstered unemployment insurance, and more.
The Justice Department has been investigating relief fraud since the relief money began rolling out. In 2021, Attorney General Merrick Garland formed the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force, and President Joe Biden highlighted his administration’s efforts to crack down on pandemic relief fraud.
“In my administration, the watchdogs have been welcomed back. We’re going after the criminals who stole billions in relief money meant for small businesses and millions of Americans. And tonight, I’m announcing that the Justice Department will name a chief prosecutor for pandemic fraud,” he said during his State of the Union address.
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Estimates of how much fraud transpired during the pandemic vary. The Secret Service announced it is pursuing nearly $100 billion worth of theft in COVID-19 relief funds. A study by a team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found only about a quarter of the Paycheck Protection Program funding paid wages “that would have otherwise been lost,” the New York Times reported. Roughly 72% of the Paycheck Protection Program funding went into the “hands of those whose household income is in America’s top 20 percent,” according to the outlet.
