The Office of the Legislative Auditor revealed on Monday that as much as 40% of the frontline worker pay program recipients defrauded the program. This potentially means that hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars were given out to anyone who asked for it.

Those who qualify for the program include nurses, first responders, prison guards, sales clerks, and janitors who worked during the 2020 and 2021 lockdowns. This program was implemented in 2022 after many Americans realized that COVID-19 was comparable to the flu. 

In the Minnesota House, only Representatives Gomez, Hassan, Koznick, Mortensen. and Xiong voted against it. It passed in a vote of 124-5.

This means that every other Republican voted for this wasteful allocation of funds. Those Republican votes include Representatives Josh Heintzeman, Greg Davids, and Brian Johnson.Those Republicans (in name only?) all voted for the Frontline Worker's Pay Bill. Representative Ron Kresha did not vote on the legislation. These five representatives are currently facing competitive primary challenges.

At least 9% of paid applicants were confirmed to have committed fraud. The remaining 31% could not be verified by the Office of the Legislative Auditor’s office (OLA).

The legislature dolled out $500 million from a federal grant to this program. After all applications were processed, each applicant received a $487.45 check.

This complete failure on behalf of the state government shows that the Walz administration is a complete and total sham. This scandal comes two years after the “Feeding Our Future” scam, where fake nonprofits stole government money which was allocated for school meals. Of course, do not forget about the state getting defrauded to the tune of $100 million in the 2017 CCAP scandal.

This is what happens when money is dolled out through these government programs. It is inevitably abused and defrauded at the expense of taxpayers.

Read the full OLA report here.