If it hasn’t happened, someone will try and dunk on the Trump administration for doling out $1.4 billion in coronavirus relief payments to dead people. This is the federal government. Screw-ups are common. This is the way of the world. Also, I’m a little shocked it wasn’t worse given how quickly the Trump administration moved to give workers relief (via NYT):
The Trump administration delivered more than a million stimulus payments worth about $1.4 billion to dead people in a rush to pump money into the economy this year, the Government Accountability Office said on Thursday.
The Treasury Department, working with the Internal Revenue Service, raced to deliver nearly $270 billion in economic impact payments to Americans this spring. But a chunk of the money ended up in the wrong places.
The improper payments reflect some of the wasteful government spending that occurred in the wake of the rapid economic stabilization effort that was undertaken after Congress passed a $2.6 trillion bailout package in March.
“The agencies faced difficulties delivering payments to some individuals, and faced additional risks related to making improper payments to ineligible individuals, such as decedents, and fraud,” the report said.
Liberals know this undercuts their narrative about vote-by-mail, right? As Tom Bevan, co-founder of Real Clear Politics, tweeted, “In rush to save economy, Treasury Dept sent out 1 million payments to dead people totaling $1.4 billion. Now tell me again how state governments mailing hundreds of millions of ballots to everyone on their voter rolls is going to result in zero fraud or abuse?”
Indeed, even The New York Times, in trying to undercut Trump’s fears about vote-by-mail, even quoted experts saying that mail voting increases the chances for fraud. In fact, in the past four elections, some 28 million ballots have vanished. There no evidence that this was due to fraud, however, but a tad disconcerting that ballots can just go ‘poof’ into the wind, no? With hundreds of millions of ballots being doled out, and with Democrats willing to do anything to beat Trump, yeah—you bet fraud will occur at worst and it’ll be a total trainwreck at best.
NYT 'breaking news': In rush to save economy, Treasury Dept sent out 1 million payments to dead people totaling $1.4 billion.
— Tom Bevan (@TomBevanRCP) June 25, 2020
Now tell me again how state govts mailing hundreds of millions of ballots to everyone on their voter rolls is going to result in zero fraud or abuse? pic.twitter.com/nnYKP05kXz
This @nytimes story is a joke.
— Tim Murtaugh - Download the Trump 2020 app today! (@TimMurtaugh) April 9, 2020
Buried in there is this nugget:
“experts say that the mail voting system is more vulnerable to fraud than voting in person.”
Invalidates the whole story.
How much fraud is acceptable to them?@realDonaldTrump is correct.https://t.co/c0CJuPhkz8
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