Democrats Continue to Ignore Waste and Fraud in Government Spending

First, there is the massive Medicaid fraud perpetrated under the watch of Minnesota's Democrat governor Tim Walz. Now the Wall Street Journal is reporting on the fraud that occurs under the Obamacare umbrella.

According to the Journal, the non-partisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) is reporting on on the fraud in Obamacare medical payments. The GAO last fall began an undercover test in which it submitted insurance applications for fictitious individuals to the federal ObamaCare exchange and insurance brokers. Nearly all of its invented people were able to enroll in subsidized plans despite submitting false or no records to verify their identities and incomes.

Of GAO’s 24 applications, 23 were approved. Eighteen enrollees were still covered as of September, suggesting that the exchange and insurers didn’t verify information even after enrollment. The subsidies paid to insurance companies for those 18 applicants totalled more than $10,000 per month, equivalent to a $6,700 annual subsidy for each enrollee.

GAO says in some cases “we were not prompted to provide documentation” to verify an applicant’s identity. No Social Security number? No problem. In another instance, the ObamaCare exchange “notified us that it had verified the applicant’s estimated income based on documentation we submitted. However, we did not submit documentation.”

GAO also analyzed enrollment data in 2023 and 2024 for data anomalies. It found more than 29,000 Social Security numbers in 2023 and nearly 68,000 in 2024 that were used to receive more than one year’s worth of insurance coverage with subsidies in a single year—meaning the same Social Security number was used by more than one person.
In 2023 one Social Security number was used to apply for more than 125 policies. Perhaps this was identity theft, but it’s also possible brokers submitted fake Social Security numbers to enroll ineligible or phantom people in plans. Brokers earn more in commissions from insurers if they enroll more people in ObamaCare.

GAO also found that incomes weren’t later verified for enrollees who received $21 billion in subsidies in 2023.

Democrats want to boost enrollment in ObamaCare no matter the cost because they view the subsidized and regulated plans as a way-station to a single-payer system.

Republicans would be wise to remind voters that Democrats sold ObamaCare on false pretenses—e.g., it would make healthcare “affordable.” Extending the subsidies would perpetuate that fraud.

Source: Wall Street Journal 12/08/2025