Waste, fraud and abuse.

Those are the three words that have been used commonly when the Trump Administration opens investigations in democratic led states.

It started in Minnesota when Conservative Youtuber Nick Shirley approached several Somali day care centers accusing them of stealing taxpayer money by opening fake centers.

Now those words are being used here in California, with state lawmakers like Kevin Kiley of Rocklin calling out what they say makes the fraud in Minnesota look tiny.

“We have almost become desensitized to it because every time there’s been an independent audit, it seems of any program in California, what is discovered is fraud on a scale that dwarves anything that was discovered in Minnesota,” Kiley said.

While the state has cracked down on some cases of fraud, Kiley is requesting that the U.S. Accountability Office conduct a study on the scale of fraud in California.

While reading the letter sent to the accountability office, he gave examples of what’s been discovered.

“During the COVID-19 pandemic, Lexus Nexus estimated state unemployment fraud reached $32.6 billion,” Kiley said. “Unemployed Californians had their benefits stolen and taxpayers were taxed to fund criminals. The state’s effort to aid the homeless is also riddled with waste and fraud. The state auditor examined spending on programs to reduce homelessness between 2019 and 2024. Despite $24 billion in spending, the number of homeless increased by 30,000 during that period and no grant recipients provided metrics that demonstrated any sort of progress.”

But the Newsom Administration says that’s not the entire case.

When asked about his response to Kiley’s claims, a spokesperson of the Governor’s Press Office responded saying quote:

“We’re glad Rep. Kiley finally recognizes what the Governor has known and worked to eliminate, like stopping $125 billion in EDD fraud and using cutting edge AI to halt more than 1 million fake student applications seeking to defraud student loan programs.”

That spokesperson also gave us several posts to the press office “X” account that they say are fact checks to the president and others claims of fraud.

Governor Newsom’s Office isn’t the only one speaking out against Kiley’s claims of overwhelming fraud in the state.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta recently spoke about how the state tackles this subject.

In a post on “X”, Bonta says in part quote:

“California is a national leader in tackling fraud on state programs and the numbers prove it: My office has recovered nearly $2.7 billion in the last 10 years. Claims that California is overrun with fraud and doing nothing about it are simply false.”