A new audit of the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency has found it made an estimated $245.1 million in improper payments to deceased people, incarcerated inmates, individuals too young or too old to receive unemployment, and the department’s own employees between January of 2020 and October of 2022.
State Senator Aric Nesbitt says it’s proof the governor’s administration is reckless with spending.
“I think this is another alarming report of gross mismanagement of taxpayers dollars by the Whitmer administration,” Nesbitt said. “The governor and her appointed officials continue to downplay these serious findings and claim they’ve fixed the problems, and yet this audit shows the problems clearly continued beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Nesbitt and other legislative leaders asked for the audit after previous audits found improper payments. He says it’s not fair fraudulent benefits were paid out while people who deserved support couldn’t get it.
“I still have constituents who deserved money during the COVID shutdown and still haven’t been able to get those paid. I’ve known them, they’ve been family friends for life and we’ve tried to work with the Unemployment Insurance Agency and they still haven’t paid those claims, and yet we see hundreds of millions on top of billions of dollars of fraudulent claims have been paid.”
Wednesday’s report is the OAG’s fifth and final audit of the UIA looking into fraud, delays, and improper payments during the pandemic in response to a 2020 request by Nesbitt and other legislative leaders.
Nesbitt first introduced a Senate resolution in June 2020 calling for a financial and performance audit of the UIA.
