Chambana Sun

A scathing report last week from the Illinois Auditor General shows $5.24 billion was stolen through “overpayments” of unemployment during fiscal years 2020-2022.   Many of us were shocked by that number as it was 2.5 times greater than previous estimates.

These overpayments aren’t just about paying people more than they were entitled to receive, most of what they classify as “overpayments” were payouts to criminals who weren’t entitled to any unemployment compensation, including $46 million worth of payments to incarcerated criminals and deceased people.  Governor Pritzker so far has held no one in his administration responsible for allowing such a massive amount of fraud to take place.

The Auditor General report makes it clear that the Illinois Department of Employment Security was negligent and incompetent in performing its duties. The report states, “IDES did not comply with all state and federal statutory and administrative requirements for processing and auditing claims...

IDES did not implement one of the tools strongly recommended in May 2020 by the US Department of Labor, until September 2021… IDES chose to not utilize the Integrity Data Hub tools because other IT-related projects were deemed to be of greater urgency during the pandemic.”

The fraud went on for three years even as reports of stolen personal information related to fraudulent unemployment claims were reported on by the media and directly to IDES by legislators and individuals as early as June 2020.

Outside contractors hired to help IDES process claims raked in over $226 million and still the fraud occurred, in part because rules set up to prevent fraud weren’t followed. Waiving or ignoring rules, even under pandemic conditions, seems criminal at this point and more questions need to be asked of the administration.  

To make matters worse, the amount of fraud was all money Illinois borrowed from the federal government and had to pay back with interest. Just a few months ago, final payments on that debt were made with taxpayers covering the remaining $1.3 billion out of the $4.5 billion that was borrowed in total.  As part of the deal, employers will be taxed more for years to replenish the fund.

The Pritzker administration excuses the fraud away as something that happened in every state under pandemic conditions. This sentiment ignores that fraud could have been limited simply by opening businesses earlier as other states did and refusing to give out enhanced benefits from the federal government which incentivized people to stay on unemployment longer and contributed to higher fraud amounts.

In a state with world class universities and many successful businesses including those in the financial and banking sector, our state has the talent and know-how to put in programs that can successfully service people who need to access benefits quickly and also guard against fraud.

Taxpayers should expect the Pritzker administration to prosecute every instance of fraud, claw back all overpayments, audit the contractors to see if they performed all duties in accordance with their contract, and fire the leadership at IDES that failed to follow the rules.

But Governor Pritzker has no plans to do any of the above. He signed legislation letting certain people who received overpayments to keep the money, he gave the IDES director during the pandemic a new job as the head of the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, and he has not had any comprehensive hearings to find out how to stop the fraud in the future.

During the pandemic most of the people in my district from all different professions kept working and paying taxes. Farmers, nurses, prison guards, educators, truck drivers and many others. They may have modified the way they worked, but they stayed at their jobs.

Others, mostly retail and restaurant workers, were sent home and told to collect unemployment.  Those forced out of their jobs by the government fully deserved their benefits and they deserved their claims to be processed in a reasonable time. Governor Pritzker shrugging off, billions of tax money wasted and stolen, shows an insensitivity to working class people who play by the rules.

My Republican colleagues and I will do everything we can to hold those responsible for this malfeasance through their own incompetence accountable.  We ask all members of the General Assembly to join us.

State Rep. Brad Halbrook (R-Shelbyville) represents the 107th House District which includes Shelby, Christian, Moultrie, Effingham, Macon, Montgomery and Cumberland counties and includes the communites of Taylorville, Effingham, Pana, Shelbyville, Mount Zion, Sullivan, Moweaqua, Teutopolis, Wenonah and Neoga.