Mehek Cooke, attorney and Republican National Committee surrogate, joined NTD to discuss the Trump administration’s withholding nearly $260 million in Medicaid payments to Minnesota until an investigation is completed, and implementing a nationwide moratorium on Medicare enrollment for certain medical equipment suppliers, in response to Medicare fraud draining billions of dollars from American taxpayers.
Cooke also discussed how the fraud proliferated over many years. Medical doctors have been rubber-stamping paperwork for Medicaid for people who do not need it, which Cooke says is prevalent in Minnesota’s second-largest Somali community in Columbus. She says the fraudsters are getting $75,000 to $90,000 per individual, and up to $250,000 for multiple individuals, who did not need home health care. Cooke says approvals are not double-checked, audits are not occurring, and kickbacks are being given to providers.
Cooke called for auditing, pausing a wide number of programs, and creating a website for companies on a fraud alert. She said the biggest red flag for fraud is when one service starts to exceed everything else. Cooke also discussed her research in knocking on doors of home health care services to investigate, and being cornered and threatened by four Somali men for asking questions. She says her objective is for the Trump administration to stop payments in Ohio until there are complete audits of what is happening in the state. -- 📺 Watch NTD News 24/7 on cable, broadcast, and streaming: https://www.ntd.com/watch
Welcome back, I'm Jack Bradley.
The Trump administration announcing new steps this week
to crack down on healthcare fraud.
Health Secretary RFK Jr. says Medicare fraud
drained billions of dollars from American taxpayers
over the decades.
Joining me now to discuss this is Mehak Cook,
attorney and Republican National Committee surrogate.
Mehak, thanks so much for joining us.
I wanna get to this new measures.
The federal government is now withholding nearly $260 million
in Medicaid payments to Minnesota
until an investigation's completed.
It's also putting a nationwide moratorium
on Medicare enrollment
for certain medical equipment suppliers.
What's your reaction to these new measures?
Well, thank God for President Trump
and the fact that we're finally taking fraud seriously.
I think Elon Musk was really the tip of the spear
when he was able to go into government
and actually expose that federal government
had so much fraud, waste, and abuse.
And if it occurred in federal government
where he was able to doge,
it was only a matter of time where states were also impacted.
And the worst part about this is
we're talking about a welfare system,
which is really supposed to be helping the American people.
So regardless of your politics,
not only what we've seen in Minnesota,
but so many states across the country,
we're seeing government basically dump dollars
onto individuals, whether they're citizens or not,
for services that are not required.
And the auditing system is so broken across our country.
So when you look at the billions of dollars of fraud,
I'm not shocked because what we were doing,
it's paying now and oversight later.
And what President Trump is demanding is oversight first.
Trust, but verify.
Make sure that the individuals asking for welfare,
first of all, qualify for it, that they're US citizens.
And then we're actually giving the services
that are needed and required.
So I think every state needs to be audited.
This isn't a blue state or a red state issue.
This is across the country.
And it was created under every single government
because we continued to put money out without oversight
and employees that were actually checking to see
if services were rendered.
And this approach obviously is aiming to be more proactive
than reactive, preventing fraud
rather than catching it later on.
How has this fraud been allowed to proliferate
this much over the years?
Well, a lot of times what states are doing
is they're immediately sending funding out or checks out.
I can tell you in the state of Ohio in particular,
I had whistleblowers who came to me to state
that there were individuals that were asking
for home health services.
And when you think of home health,
it is immediately shielded
because individuals are self-reporting.
They're going to doctors that were rubber stamping
paperwork for Medicaid.
And in Ohio and many other states,
you are allowed to take care of your loved ones
so that they aren't going to nursing homes.
And while that's very compassionate, it's right for fraud.
So you have providers that were rubber stamping paperwork
for individuals that did not need it.
It's prevalent.
We're the second largest Somalian population
in the United States of America,
right here in Columbus, Ohio.
So these individuals are not only getting paper,
rubber stamps for family members that don't need it,
they're making 75 to $90,000 per individual.
You add two family members, that's $180,000.
You add in-laws, you're making $250,000
for individuals that never needed home health care.
So it's being rubber stamped.
The approvals are not being double-checked.
Audits are not occurring.
And I think that there's also kickbacks occurring
because some of these providers were offered money
if they would just rubber stamp paperwork.
So this is just one case of many.
Nick Shirley has exposed so much in Minnesota.
In California, we're seeing this in Maine as well.
It's an oversight and bureaucratic issue
because government loves to spend taxpayer money
with no accountability.
And these new measures that we're seeing
coming out of the Trump administration,
do you think more like this is what we need?
Or are there gonna be more drastic measures
that the administration's gonna have to take down the road?
I think that the first phase is absolutely using AI
to start detecting fraud.
It's to make sure that we have enough employees
that are actually looking at oversight.
It's making sure we're not immediately paying,
that we're pausing many of these programs
to see where the money is going out.
And also one of the biggest things that I saw
is creating a website so that when we know
that companies are on a fraud alert
or have been conducting fraud, we all can look at them.
We can all say in the state,
we're not going to be engaging with these companies.
And the biggest red flag for fraud
is when you have one service
that starts to exceed everything else.
We saw it in Minnesota for autism services.
A lot of times it's translation services.
We've seen that in Maine.
So I think we really need to start auditing
every time dollars are going out
and doing independent verification and testing.
And that's exactly what the administration is saying.
We'll pay for services that are valid.
We'll make sure that US citizens
are actually getting the services that they need.
And taxpayers are all forefooting the need
that said that state government was ignoring
the fact that they were reporting fraud
and that it was rampant in the Somalian community,
Nepalese, and even Bhutanese community.
Many of these communities come to America.
I can speak at least in Columbus, Ohio.
They tend to be isolated.
They tend not to speak English.
And then they tend to get translation services
and figure out systems on how they can get onto welfare.
So when I realized that the government
wasn't doing anything, I immediately started researching it.
I started reaching out to home healthcare services
and I started asking questions.
And I was met with immediate vitriol.
And I have to ask anybody that you've seen videos
of me just knocking on a door and asking questions
or being cornered by four Somalian men
and being threatened and asked why I'm investigating
or asking questions,
if this is where you would leave your loved ones,
whether it's a daycare center
or what I was looking for is also home healthcare.
And I am looking at this because I really believe
that these are our taxpayer dollars
and if government isn't going to do anything,
then citizen journalists and attorneys
need to start raising their hand
and putting it on social media
and the payments need to stop.
My objective is for the president and his administration
to stop payments in our state as well, the state of Ohio,
until we have complete audits of what's happening.
Because I think government has turned their back
on so many hardworking Ohioans today.
Well, thank you for sharing your insights with us.
Mehek Cook will be paying attention
to this story very closely.
Thank you.
