Exclusive — Sen. Joni Ernst Aims to Stop Fraudulent Payments as Pay-For in Big Beautiful Bill Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) told Breitbart News that she aims to codify her fixes in the Big Beautiful Bill to prevent fraudulent payments in federal programs.

“A lack of safeguards in government spending allowed criminals to have a field day and steal hundreds of billions in COVID aid,” Ernst told Breitbart News in a written statement.

“Unfortunately, this is not limited to just COVID assistance. While bureaucrats are asleep at the wheel, a lack of proper oversight is allowing tens of billions in fraudulent payments to occur every year. Congress must include my legislation in the Big Beautiful Bill to make permanent President Trump’s executive action and effectively eliminate improper payments,” she continued.

Ernst spoke to Breitbart News as the Senate is crafting its version of the Big Beautiful Bill. The Hawkeye State senator, as the chair of the Small Business Committee, aims to have her bill, the Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE) in Spending Act, as a pay-for in Trump’s marquee bill to stop fraudulent and improper federal payments.

The legislation could have a significant effect, as more than $160 billion in improper payments occurred in fiscal year 2024.

The bill requires that the Treasury Department have a description of each payment, linked to a budget account, and crosschecked against government databases to ensure accuracy and eligibility.

Breitbart News reported that an investigation from the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee discovered that $79 billion in coronavirus aid fraud could have been prevented had bureaucrats installed basic vetting measures before sending aid.

“The codes provided by SSA indicated that the identifying information (SSN, name, DOB) provided by applicants in almost 24,000 of the 662,000 [recipients analyzed] did not fully match the information in SSAs records, indicating potential fraud,” the report noted, adding a table with a breakdown by verification code.

Breitbart News catalogued five times that bureaucrats were “asleep at the wheel” policing coronavirus aid fraud.

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