The United States is experiencing high levels of fraud that Vice President JD Vance characterized as "unbelievable" while he promoted Republican candidates for office in Maine.
Vance, who was in the Pine Street state on May 14, chairs a fraud task force ordered by President Donald Trump to identify and prosecute bad actors.
"You've got an administration in Washington DC that is fighting for you, fighting to protect your tax dollars and fighting to put the fraudsters in prison, which is where they belong," he told a cheering crowd.
There are seven Republican and five Democratic candidates vying to replace current governor Janet Mills, a Democrat, who is term-limited.
The primary election is on June 9.
“I'll say this to the governor and anybody else, if you want a partner in fighting fraud, you've got one,” Vance said. “This does not need to be Republican versus Democrat. This needs to be fraudster against non-fraudster. This needs to be good government versus bad.”
Among the examples of "unbelievable" systemic abuse that Vance cited was a Lewiston, Maine, investigation involving Rakiya Mohamed, in which Mohamed pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court in Portland to filing a false tax return and interfering with the administration of federal tax laws.
Other instances of alleged fraud that Vance mentioned included payments being issued to dead individuals for food stamps, people driving high-end vehicles, such as Lamborghinis, while collecting low-income housing and food assistance, and fraudsters stealing identities to claim hospice benefits for patients who are not terminally ill.
“They're stealing somebody else's identity claiming hospice services and then when that hardworking American goes to apply for some other benefit, they get tagged by the bank as being a fraud even though it wasn't them,” Vance said. “It was somebody who stole their identity. Isn't that a shame?”
Vance took the opportunity to urge the crowd to vote for Paul LePage, a former Governor of Maine who is now running for a seat in Congress.
LePage served as the governor of Maine for two terms from Jan. 5, 2011, to Jan. 2, 2019.
“I can't even compare to your great former governor because while I love this state as an outsider, he loves this state as somebody who has fought for it every single day … protecting your tax dollars, protecting your essential services, protecting your local law enforcement, making sure common sense that the government actually works for the people who deserve and have the right to be in the United States to begin with,” Vance added.