Kane County Reporter

An Illinois state representative who is a small businessman and financial expert has criticized Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker’s administration for failure to report fraudulent pandemic unemployment claims.

State Rep. Martin McLaughlin (R-Lake Barrington) on Facebook cited a report that the U.S. Department of Labor said Illinois’ failure to report fraudulent pandemic unemployment claims will make fraud easier to commit in the future. Approximately $1.9 billion of $3.6 billion in Pandemic Unemployment Assistance payments that were distributed from July 2020 to June 2021 to illegitimate accounts, Illinois Policy cited a report from Illinois Auditor General Frank Mautino.

“$1.9 billion -- yes Billion dollars with a B, were paid out on fraudulent IDES claims by the state. This WAS AFTER we approved an emergency $24 million appropriation for fraud detection, but the Governor's administration did nothing to track the illegal activity, making the state's program vulnerable to the same type of abuse in the future,” McLaughlin said on Facebook. “Where, to whom and on what was the taxpayers' $24 million spent? Sadly, in Illinois, the buck stops nowhere.”

Congress and the (Employment and Training Administration) need accurate state performance information to assess state activities and mitigate the risk of overpayments and fraud for future programs, Illinois Policy said.

People wanting to exploit Illinois’ unemployment benefits have online resources, Illinois Policy reported David Maimon, a criminology professor at Georgia State University, as saying.

“We see many identities, many bank accounts, many driver’s licenses that are associated with Illinois residents’ for sale on the dark web,” Maimon told Illinois Policy.

Illinois officials said they updated software to improve security, and the General Assembly passed two new laws that extend the “statute of limitations for prosecuting” identify theft and fraudulent stimulus loans, according to Illinois Policy. Some people think that the new protections don’t go far enough.

“They’re claiming it’s fixed, and I’m telling you, it’s not fixed,” Haywood Talcove, CEO of LexisNexis Risk Solutions, told Illinois Policy.

Mautino’s report said that identity theft and traditional fraud resulted in overpayments within the PUA program that was unprecedented, with approximately $163 billion in unemployment payments being fraudulent nationwide, Illinois Newsroom said.

“In response to the report, Illinois Republicans called for hearings to investigate the Illinois Department of Employment Security's (IDES) procedures in making unemployment payments to determine whether the agency failed to follow recommendations for fraud prevention,” Illinois Newsroom said.

After Pritzker ordered businesses to shut down in the spring of 2020, Illinois saw a spike in unemployment claims, leading to the accumulation of billions of dollars of unemployment debt, The Center Square reported. Illinois put some federal relief funds towards paying down the debt, but there is still a remaining balance of $1.8 billion accruing interest.