As conservative journalists like Nick Shirley continue to unearth and expose fraud all over America, particularly in blue states like Minnesota and California, it is worth remembering that the Trump Administration has made cracking down on such fraud a major objective, as was revealed by a press release in June of 2025 in which it announced the largest healthcare fraud crackdown ever.
Announcing the results of the crackdown in a press release, the DOJ noted that the nationwide operation involved the arrest of hundreds of defendants, including nearly 100 healthcare professionals of various sorts, and involved nearly $15 billion in fraud.
It said, “The Justice Department today announced the results of its 2025 National Health Care Fraud Takedown, which resulted in criminal charges against 324 defendants, including 96 doctors, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, and other licensed medical professionals, in 50 federal districts and 12 State Attorneys General’s Offices across the United States, for their alleged participation in various health care fraud schemes involving over $14.6 billion in intended loss.”
Yet further, billions of dollars in attempted fraud were prevented during the operation, and those who attempted it forever cut off: “As part of the whole-of-government approach to combating health care fraud announced today, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) also announced that it successfully prevented over $4 billion from being paid in response to false and fraudulent claims and that it suspended or revoked the billing privileges of 205 providers in the months leading up to the Takedown.”
Further, the government announced in that press release that it had seized all sorts of illegal proceeds of the massive crime, saying, “Demonstrating the significant return on investment that results from health care fraud enforcement efforts, the government seized over $245 million in cash, luxury vehicles, cryptocurrency, and other assets as part of the coordinated enforcement efforts.”
The overwhelming majority of the fraud was engaged in by foreigners, particularly “transnational criminal organizations,” as the DOJ went on to explain. It said, “29 defendants were charged for their roles in transnational criminal organizations alleged to have submitted over $12 billion in fraudulent claims to America’s health insurance programs.”
Adding to that, it explained where the foreign fraudsters were caught, saying, “Twelve of these defendants have been arrested, including four defendants who were apprehended in Estonia as a result of international cooperation with Estonian law enforcement and seven defendants who were arrested at U.S. airports and the U.S. border with Mexico, cutting off their intended escape routes as they attempted to avoid capture.”
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And, describing how the foreign fraud operation worked, it explained, “The organization allegedly used a network of foreign straw owners, including individuals sent into the United States from abroad, who, acting at the direction of others using encrypted messaging and assumed identities from overseas, strategically bought dozens of medical supply companies located across the United States. They then rapidly submitted $10.6 billion in fraudulent health care claims to Medicare for urinary catheters and other durable medical equipment by exploiting the stolen identities of over one million Americans spanning all 50 states and using their confidential medical information to submit the fraudulent claims.”
Continuing to describe the essentially foreign nature of the fraud, the statement said, “As alleged, the organization exploited the U.S. financial system by laundering the fraudulent proceeds and deploying a range of tactics to circumvent anti-money laundering controls to transfer funds into cryptocurrency and shell companies located abroad. The arrests announced today also include a banker who facilitated the money laundering of fraud proceeds on behalf of the organization through a U.S.-based bank.”
Watch the acting inspector general describe the operation here: