House lawmakers are set to take up three anti-fraud measures that would expand Justice Department enforcement, increase federal health care fraud resources and require states to provide investigators with information involving suspected fraud in major government programs.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom.
The House is scheduled to return Monday with federal fraud enforcement near the top of its agenda, as lawmakers prepare to consider three bills aimed at strengthening investigations, expanding cooperation between Washington and the states and directing additional resources toward fraud involving taxpayer-funded programs.
The package would establish a Justice Department division headed by an assistant attorney general devoted to fraud cases, substantially increase funding for health care program integrity work and create new requirements for states to share information with the federal government when fraud is suspected in programs including Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and pandemic-era relief initiatives. The legislation comes amid continuing federal and state investigations involving billions of dollars in alleged or suspected fraud across government assistance programs.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the three measures are intended to reinforce the Trump administration’s broader fraud enforcement effort.
“Fraudsters have stolen billions in taxpayer dollars from programs meant to help Americans in need, while Democrat leaders looked the other way,” Scalise said. “President Trump and House Republicans are bringing an end to this rampant fraud. With these three bills on the floor this week, the House is answering Vice President [J.D.]Vance’s call for Congress to support the incredible work of the White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud. Accountability is coming for anyone trying to defraud the American people.”
One of the measures, the National Fraud Enforcement Division Act of 2026, would formally establish a National Fraud Enforcement Division inside the Justice Department. The division would operate under the attorney general and be led by an assistant attorney general appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
Under the proposal, the assistant attorney general would “lead the efforts of the Department of Justice to investigate, prosecute, and remedy fraud affecting the Federal Government, Federally funded programs, and citizens of the United States.” The official would also oversee multi-district and multi-agency investigations, assist U.S. attorneys’ offices with fraud cases, coordinate with federal agencies, develop national enforcement priorities and recommend legislative or regulatory changes intended to close vulnerabilities that could be exploited by fraud schemes.
A second measure, the Protecting Taxpayers from Health Care Fraudsters Act, would direct additional resources toward the Department of Health and Human Services, its Office of Inspector General, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and federal law enforcement to combat fraudulent health care payments. The legislation would increase mandatory anti-fraud funding from the Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, with the added funding concentrated between fiscal years 2027 and 2030.
The bill would also broaden resources available for health care fraud detection and enforcement, including authority for the HHS inspector general to use designated funds to “detect or prosecute health care fraud and abuse” and to communicate with the public about health care fraud. The proposal includes multibillion-dollar increases across several federal health program integrity and enforcement accounts during the four-year period.
The third proposal, the Preventing Rip-offs and Obtaining Oversight of Funds Act, or PROOF Act, would create a federal framework for obtaining fraud-related information from states. The measure is designed to “enhance information-sharing” between federal law enforcement and state agencies as authorities investigate suspected fraud involving government programs.
Under the bill, a state official administering a covered program would be required, after receiving a written request from the U.S. attorney general, to provide information needed for an investigation or prosecution. Covered programs would include Medicaid, SNAP, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, state unemployment compensation programs, the Coronavirus Relief Fund, pandemic-era state and local fiscal recovery programs and several other federally funded programs.
Information subject to the measure could include identity-verification records, benefit-disbursement logs, provider billing statements and demographic information directly connected to an active fraud investigation. The bill also includes privacy and security provisions requiring information to be handled under applicable federal privacy laws, encrypted during transfer, restricted to authorized personnel and removed after the relevant investigation or legal proceeding concludes.
Vice President JD Vance called for greater information sharing in August, saying federal investigators had encountered difficulties obtaining data needed to identify potentially fraudulent activity.
“There are a few things that we really need to do and that we can’t do in the federal government without the cooperation of Congress,” Vance said. “And the first, I would say the most important of these is data sharing. So, when we’ve looked at the anti-fraud efforts that we’ve taken, one of the weirdest and most difficult parts of this is the black box that exists around certain state programs.”
The administration’s fraud task force had identified approximately $230 billion in suspected fraud and halted roughly $55 billion in payments it flagged as fraudulent, according to figures cited in connection with Vance’s remarks.
Fraud investigations in Minnesota have provided one prominent backdrop to the congressional effort. Federal prosecutors have charged more than 90 defendants in fraud cases in the state, with more than 80 of those defendants identified as being of Somali descent. Separately, a Somali-operated Minnesota facility called “The Quality Learing Center” appeared inactive despite being licensed to care for 99 children.
The Feeding Our Future case became one of the largest pandemic-related fraud prosecutions in the country. Federal prosecutors announced the 78th defendant in the case in November 2025, alleging that participants used a federal child nutrition program to obtain money based on false claims about meals provided to children. DOJ said at the time that the 78th defendant had been charged with wire fraud and money laundering and emphasized that an indictment is an allegation and defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
Altogether, 78 defendants were charged in connection with the scheme, which authorities said involved more than $350 million taken from Feeding Our Future, a federally funded child nutrition program.
The scope of fraud tied to pandemic assistance programs has extended far beyond Minnesota. An estimated $280 billion in COVID-19 assistance was stolen by fraudsters, while another $123 billion was estimated to have been wasted or misspent. A separate June 2025 report said about $400 billion in pandemic assistance had been improperly directed using falsified or stolen Social Security numbers.
SNAP has also faced extensive theft. States reported replacing more than $320 million in stolen benefits between October 2022 and December 2024, according to a December 2025 Government Accountability Office report. GAO said the total extent of the theft was unknown and could exceed the amount replaced because some recipients may not have known they could submit claims and federal law limited the number of replacement claims.
In another SNAP case, a Maryland man was sentenced to 54 months in federal prison for what prosecutors described as masterminding a benefits fraud scheme along with related crimes.
SNAP has separately been at the center of a dispute over what products recipients may purchase with program benefits. A federal judge appointed during the Obama administration ruled in June that SNAP recipients could continue using benefits to purchase foods targeted by state restrictions. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins had approved waivers in 23 states permitting restrictions on purchases including candy and soda before a judge blocked the administration’s policy, Reuters reported.
“USDA is empowering states with greater flexibility to manage their programs by approving SNAP Food Restriction Waivers that restrict the purchase of non-nutritious items like soda and candy,” the department said in a statement describing the waiver policy. “These waivers are a key step in ensuring that taxpayer dollars provide nutritious options that improve health outcomes within SNAP.”
The Justice Department has meanwhile pursued fraud investigations outside Minnesota. Its National Fraud Enforcement Division uncovered roughly $350 million in alleged fraud in late July across southeastern states including Alabama, Florida and Georgia. The cases involved alleged fraud connected to SNAP, Small Business Administration loans, housing assistance and taxes.
Those states entered data-sharing agreements giving the Justice Department access to “publicly available corporate registration and public benefits payment data held by these state agencies,” an approach similar to the information-sharing structure lawmakers are now seeking to expand through legislation.
The three bills scheduled for consideration after the House returns are not Congress’ first fraud-related measures this year. The House previously advanced other anti-fraud legislation, including measures identified as the Deporting Fraudsters Act of 2026 and the Stop Child Care Scams Act of 2026.
The latest package would broaden that effort by addressing three distinct areas when lawmakers return: centralized Justice Department fraud enforcement, additional health care anti-fraud funding and mandatory state-federal information sharing designed to give investigators greater access to records used in suspected fraud cases.
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