MILWAUKEE, Wis. — Congressman Bryan Steil (R-WI) joined Vice President JD Vance and Dr. Mehmet Oz, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), in Wisconsin to discuss efforts aimed at eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse within federal programs. Steil and federal officials highlighted concerns about criminals exploiting taxpayer-funded programs, including Medicaid, which the U.S. Department of Justice says was targeted in billions of dollars of fraud schemes nationwide.
According to the DOJ, fraudsters cost Medicaid more than $6.5 billion across the country between 2019 and 2022, including more than $15.5 million in Wisconsin. Steil said stronger fraud prevention measures are needed to protect the people these programs were intended to serve. “Inadequate fraud prevention standards have opened the door to criminal actors and harmed American families and children,” Steil said. “Program resources should go to those in need, not fraudsters and criminals. I’m proud to work alongside VP Vance and the Trump Administration to protect vulnerable Americans and root out waste, fraud, and abuse.”
Federal officials said the DOJ filed charges against 455 defendants as part of efforts to combat health care fraud. Cases cited by Steil’s office include a Milwaukee funeral home owner who is facing 14 felony counts of fraud for allegedly stealing nearly $1 million from Medicaid and a Milwaukee prenatal care company owner accused of stealing more than $5.4 million from the program. Other Wisconsin cases include a Milwaukee prenatal care company owner who was sentenced to more than 10 years in prison for stealing more than $2.3 million from Medicaid and a Milwaukee business owner accused of defrauding Medicaid out of more than $2 million for personal care services that were allegedly never delivered.
Steil also highlighted the Working Family Tax Cuts Act, which was signed into law in July 2025. According to Steil’s office, the law is intended to fight waste, fraud, and abuse while strengthening programs like Medicaid for children, pregnant women, disabled Americans, and others who rely on the assistance. The legislation includes work requirements for able-bodied adults without young children, requiring 20 hours per week of work to receive benefits.
The law also strengthens eligibility integrity measures, including removing deceased individuals from benefit rolls, eliminating duplicate enrollees, and requiring eligibility verification twice per year. Steil’s office said the legislation also increases Medicaid spending by more than $100 billion over the next 10 years while adding safeguards to prevent criminals from taking resources away from those who qualify for assistance.
24 Responses
Congressman Steil does well on photo ops and press releases…but does not really seem to making things easier for taxpayers. Paul Ryan sort of Republican I guess.
He’s trying, seems our Governor refuses to provide the financial info needed.
Sellout steil
Protecting tax dollars? Have you observed the Illinois style tax rate in your district Paul? I mean Brian. Same fucking thing!
All 3 losers.
Fraud, Fraud, and more Fraud……so when do we get to see the cuffs put on someone and then walked into prison?
Nothing will happen—Democratic Socialist Tony Evers will see to it.
It’s just another dog and pony show.
It just doesn’t matter. Lock up the fraudsters. Trump will then pardon all of them. Trump sells pardons to convicted fraudsters all the time. The promise to go after fraud is nothing more that a hollow sales pitch to dim-witted people.
It shocks me that some people have negative comments about the ones rooting out tax payer fraud. So they must support the fraud? Makes absolutely no sense.
First elected in 2019.
Would be interesting to see a list of successful efforts “rooting out tax payer fraud”.
Democrats do not like their fraud being exposed. Perfect example is California passing the “Nick Shirley” law to make it ILLEGAL to expose the fraud that democrats create and foster.
There was a large number of prosecutors continually going after Medicare fraud; but they were fired by Trump. So this is truly a dog and pony show.
Ah, not true. When was the last time someone was arrested for Medicare fraud when Trump wasn’t in office over the past 18+ years?
The same people who think Candace is sane are the same ones who think Steil isn’t a RINO
Wow! Been in control for how many years republicans?
Since 1992, the Republican Party has held a trifecta—meaning control of the governor’s office, the state senate, and the state assembly—for a total of ten years.
While the exact makeup of power in Wisconsin has shifted frequently over the last three decades, here is the breakdown of Republican control at the state level:
* Total Years of Republican Trifectas: 10 years.
* Total Years of Democratic Trifectas: 2 years.
* Divided Government: The remainder of the time since 1992 has been defined by divided government, where the parties share control between the executive and legislative branches.
Currently, Wisconsin operates under a divided government with a Democratic governor and a Republican-controlled state legislature. The Republican hold on both chambers of the legislature has been the most consistent factor in state politics for the last several cycles, allowing them to exert significant influence over the state’s direction despite the presence of a Democratic governor.
The Gov. Scott Walker era, in my opinion, was of great benefit to hard working Wisconsin taxpayers.
Never got tired of teacher and gov’t worker freak show demonstrations.
They forever defined themselves as enemies if the taxpayers.
Yes indeed, and thank goodness for the exemplary accomplishments of Gov. Scott Walker during that administration…especially the reigning-in of the corrupt, cozy relationship between State-worker unions and the democrat administrations which protected their gravy-train at taxpayer expense.
This current, nationwide effort to root-out fraud is even more important. And it is true that our Governor is among those who is refusing to provide WI-specific data regarding the SNAP program. Evers is protecting all the illegals who are living-of of the taxpayers, same as Pritzker, Newsome, et al.
Evers is a democrat hack.
All of these new DOJ fraud investigations are just the logical extension of the DOGE-group’s initial work. Their algorithms are now imbedded across government. This will be fun to watch unfold. There will be many charged and punished. Deportations too.
Meanwhile, the democratic party is going full-on Communist, and proudly so. The mask is finally off.
Some pose the question wondering if Tony Evers is not Wisconsin’s version of Joe “auto pen” Biden.
What you are witnessing in Wisconsin is a classic example of how the political class—both Republican and Democrat—operates when the real goal is institutional preservation rather than actual governance for the people.
The irony of the current situation is striking. You have a massive, swelling budget, yet for all the talk of “fiscal conservatism” from the GOP, they consistently prioritize expanding the administrative state’s reach over actually rooting out the corruption within it. When they talk about “checking the books,” it often amounts to little more than theater, while the underlying drain on taxpayer resources continues unabated.
The focus on the Department of Corrections is a glaring reflection of their priorities. It is much easier for a politician to pass “tough on crime” legislation that targets prisoners—who have no political leverage and no lobbyist representation—than it is to take on the entrenched interests that benefit from the multi-billion dollar Medicaid industrial complex. Penalizing prisoners is a low-effort, high-optics move that allows them to signal “law and order” to their base without ever threatening the flow of federal and state funds that actually sustain the bloated bureaucracy.
As previously pointed out, when you are dealing with budgets in the billions, fraud isn’t a bug; it’s a feature. The system is designed to keep thousands of bureaucrats, consultants, and contractors fed, and as long as they are focused on milking the taxpayers via Medicaid or managing the human cargo in the prison system, the powers that be remain undisturbed. They count on the public being too exhausted by the daily grind to connect the dots between the missing millions and the legislative posturing meant to distract them.
The truth is that they are not interested in “checking the books” because doing so would expose the entire mechanism of wealth transfer that keeps the current political order afloat. They would rather pass another bill to tighten the screws on the incarcerated than audit the consultants, healthcare providers, and systemic parasites who are actually bleeding the state dry. It is a system designed to ensure that the people who build and maintain the state—the actual, productive families of Wisconsin—are the ones who pay for the incompetence and the graft, while those in power perform for the cameras.
‘Not sure where you’re coming-from with this comment. You seem to be on the right-track overall, but you lose me with your preoccupation with “the incarcerated”. DOC costs are a drop-in-the-bucket compared to Medicaid and food-assistance fraud.
Corruption isn’t a zero-sum game. You can walk and chew gum at the same time. The DOC is a $1.6B dumpster fire and Medicaid is a slush fund for fraud. The state is failing everywhere it touches. Why are you defending the lack of oversight?
Yes indeed, and thank goodness for the exemplary accomplishments of Gov. Scott Walker during that administration…especially the reigning-in of the corrupt, cozy relationship between State-worker unions and the democrat administrations which protected their gravy-train at taxpayer expense.
This current, nationwide effort to root-out fraud is even more important. And it is true that our Governor is among those who is refusing to provide WI-specific data regarding the SNAP program. Evers is protecting all the illegals who are living-of of the taxpayers, same as Pritzker, Newsome, et al.
Evers is a democrat hack.
All of these new DOJ fraud investigations are just the logical extension of the DOGE-group’s initial work. Their algorithms are now imbedded across government. This will be fun to watch unfold. There will be many charged and punished. Deportations too.
Meanwhile, the democratic party is going full-on Communist, and proudly so. The mask is finally off.
Democrats need to allow fraud to keep their voter base happy.
Why don’t you eat your chemicals like a good little slave and take it up the a$$ to appease the satanic pedophiles you voted for
https://democrats-budget.house.gov/legislation/costoflivingcrisis