[JustTheNews] Federal committee found tens of thousands of dishonest or erroneous Paycheck Protection Program applications.
In a new investigation, a federal committee tasked with tracking COVID-19 assistance fraud found tens of thousands of dishonest or erroneous Paycheck Protection Program applications.
It was designed that way, to get money into the economy as quickly as possible.
The Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC) report, released this month, revealed more than 40,000 instances when applicants for more than $860 million in taxpayer-funded PPP loans “significantly misrepresented their incomes.”
The Small Business Administration, which distributed the PPP loans, allocated more than $1 trillion in taxpayer-funded pandemic assistance to more than 10 million small businesses.
A recent report from the Government Accountability Office showed that nearly 2 million potentially fraudulent SBA applications – including the 40,000 PPP applications – still require investigation, as The Center Square reported.
PRAC said it achieved its findings by comparing the reported incomes of sole proprietor PPP applicants with the reported incomes of applicants for Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) assistance grants using the same personally identifiable information.
Data analysts found “significant [income] misrepresentations…where the derived income for PPP applicants was at least 10 times greater than the income reported to HUD by housing assistance recipients.”
PRAC said the inconsistencies could be due to fraud, identity theft, data entry errors, or data timing issues.
One confirmed example of fraud involved an applicant who received a $20,833 PPP loan based on his alleged $100,000 annual income reported to SBA. But the same individual reported an annual income of $600 to HUD, while claiming to own multiple other businesses receiving nearly $900,000 in PPP loans and other pandemic aid.
Since the pandemic, when the federal government cumulatively spent $5 trillion in COVID-19 related aid, lawmakers and organizations have held oversight hearings into at least $200 billion lost to fraud, only $5 billion of which has been recovered.
Most of that fraud was preventable, according to PRAC and other watchdog groups.
“We hope that by sharing this potential fraud scheme with the public and the oversight community we can alert (1) Offices of Inspectors General (OIGs) to be on the lookout for similar cross-program schemes, (2) program implementers to build better internal controls and checks upfront to mitigate this risk, and (3) policymakers to consider issues related to cross-agency risks including income verification,” PRAC concluded.
Perfect timing. The needs of treatment won’t interfere with pretending to run the country.
[FOX] Former President Joe Biden's office confirmed on Sunday that he was diagnosed with an "aggressive form" of prostate cancer.
"Last week, President Joe Biden was seen for a new finding of a prostate nodule after experiencing increasing urinary symptoms," Biden's team shared in a statement. "On Friday, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, characterized by a Gleason score of 9 (Grade Group 5) with metastasis to the bone."
"While this represents a more aggressive form of the disease, the cancer appears to be hormone-sensitive which allows for effective management. The President and his family are reviewing treatment options with his physicians," the statement said.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
05/19/2025 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[364 views]
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#3
And so, once again, the DC Swamp and their propaganda media arm deflect from the truth.
This time, using Cancer to deflect from the real issue of Mental Incapacity. By playing a Cancer narrative for sympathy, in attempts to cover up and deflect from the massive criminal wrong doing, done by those actually running the WH.
#4
Ref #3: Yes, "timeline" points to a typical 'Deep State' Cover for Action. PSA testing? Blood in urine, pain, difficulty in urination. Testing; MRI, DRI analysis all neglected on the #1 man ?
Like everything else about the Bidens, very suspect.
Dr. Steven Hatfill, a senior medical advisor at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), has just blown the whistle to warn the public about the deadly impact of Covid mRNA "vaccines."
How many boosters did he and other DC Swampers get????????
#10
My understanding is the DC Elite received the approved.......
.....UH60 evacuation plan from the Capital to National Airport. No issues with the historically crowded airspace, it'll be a commercial 'NO FLY' zone in a national emergency.
#15
^ Zeke Emmanuel, brother to Ari and Rahm. No Republican
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/19/2025 12:12 Comments ||
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#16
...I'm starting to wonder if now some poor bastard isn't going to be thrown to the wolves as 'the one responsible for the cover-up', whether they were or not.
#18
some poor bastard isn't going to be thrown to the wolves
The White House physician who did his annual exams, pronouncing him healthy, at the very least, MikeKozlowski. Can RFK, Jr. yank his license? What about the doctor(s) who certified him healthy to run?
#20
Just because he was on TV getting an injection doesn't mean it was the Clot Shot. Could be any one of a number of innocuous liquids like normal saline, D5W or Ringers etc..
#21
Is it possible that Joe B refused to take the PSA test during his Presidency or that he convinced his doctor to not give this test?
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
05/19/2025 18:34 Comments ||
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#22
^ It's part of common blood tests that any responsible sentient person would be taking annually at least...
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/19/2025 18:45 Comments ||
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#23
^
PSA test was not mentioned in the Feb 2024 report by the WH Physician although report did report a urinalysis and full blood analysis
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
05/19/2025 18:54 Comments ||
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#24
^ i.e.: They knew. He would withdraw after winning re-election and Qweeen Kamala would take over (Obama's 4th and 5th terms)
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/19/2025 19:18 Comments ||
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#25
Various medical talking heads are now saying he's had to have had the condition for years, which means the WH doc and family have likely been lying for years.
Sympathy play at this point. Might have even been why they pulled him from the running in 2024. Just speculation on my part.
#26
Immediate family made the decisions on how to frame this announcement. Dr Jill’s fingerprints are all over this. Cancer is the latest basement to avoid talking about who was running the autopen.
#27
State medical boards control whether or not a physician practicing in the USA has a license. The feds (or the courts) have no say in the matter. Last I checked Fauci still has his Maryland license to practice medicine.
Is it possible that Joe B refused to take the PSA test during his Presidency or that he convinced his doctor to not give this test?
Quite possible. The oncologist Ezekiel Emmanuel "“It is a little surprising that the doctor didn’t take it. And if he took it and didn’t report it and it was elevated, that is another case of doctors not being straightforward with us."
It is also possible Biden was getting his actual care for the past several years from a physician whose existence/name has never been disclosed. That would be an ideal way of having all this known for some time and concealing it 100% from the public.
In addition:
Emanuel noted that while some doctors recommended not doing a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) exam – a routine bloodwork test – after the age of 70, he [Biden] should have had those exams when he was younger.
From an online Harvard newsletter:
USPSTF guidelines: These independent experts on preventive medicine do not recommend PSA screening for prostate cancer in men at any age, due to a lack of definitive evidence that the benefits of PSA testing are greater than the risks.
"Several large studies asked whether PSA screening of men with no urinary symptoms would save lives, but people don't want to believe the answers that came from these studies," says Dr. Marc B. Garnick, a prostate cancer specialist at Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Editor in Chief of the Harvard Medical School Annual Report on Prostate Diseases. "If you want to know whether you have prostate cancer, you should have a PSA test and a biopsy, but that decision is primarily driven by emotion."
I have quoted this to several old guys my age in the last 24 hours, and they were astounded to learn this is the currently recommended do-nothing advice of medical "experts". Of course a decision to have a PSA test done is "primarily driven by emotion". I don't know about the rest of Rantburgers, but my desire to keep living has ALWAYS been "primarily driven by emotion." Dr. Garnick is a different breed of human being, I guess.
Dr Emanuel also noted that PSA tests on Biden have never been published, to the best of his knowledge.
#29
"It's part of common blood tests that any responsible sentient person would be taking annually at least..."
Are you implying this nationally known prostate cancer "expert" Dr. Marc Garnick is NOT a responsible sentient person, along with those who formulated the USPSTF guidelines???
We definitely need a better class of experts, but then we have been aware of that since COVID-19.
Keep in mind that 80% of men over 80 years old have some amount of prostate cancer cells. Though the American Urological Association and the US Preventive Services Task Force don’t recommend routine PSA screening in men over the age of 70, I believe they are wrong.
Could it be that the president didn’t have even a PSA during his yearly physical? That would be disturbing, and difficult to believe.
The test is not pointless. With today’s advanced treatments, from robotic prostatectomy to targeted radiation to advances in hormone treatments, there is no reason not to know that an 82-year-old president has prostate cancer these days, or anyone for that matter.
Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX), who served as White House physician under Trump and former President Barack Obama, told the Washington Examiner that it's "completely unbelievable" that Biden's cancer diagnosis went unnoticed during his term in office.
"Just the nature of the disease, he's had prostate cancer for years now. If it's to that point, and it wasn't picked up by his physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, I mean, it's complete malpractice in my mind, to be honest with you," he said in an interview. "Either he did the exam and he didn't report it, and then that makes you wonder, why did he not report it? Was it positive? Did they know he had prostate cancer? Or he didn't do the exam. He didn't do the PSA or Digital Rectal Exam, or anything like that, and there's no excuse for not doing that. He's the President of the United States."
Health guidance for the general public from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends against PSA-based screening for men age 70 and older due to false positives, as well as diagnosis of problems that wouldn’t have caused death.
However, as president, Biden should have had access to the "pinnacle" of treatment, Jackson said.
"If you pick it up early, it's curable, right? And just to have the President of the United States, who's supposed to have access to world-class health care, whose White House medical unit is supposed to be the pinnacle of concierge medicine, executive medicine, and to not pick up on something like this," Jackson continued. "I'm quite honestly shocked, and it's just, it's not good."
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] At least 27 people have died as a result of hurricanes and tornadoes in the central United States. This was reported on May 17 by The New York Times.
According to the publication, 27 people were killed by destructive tornadoes that were caused by a strong storm in the mid-Atlantic and swept across the central part of the United States from May 16 to 17. According to preliminary data, 26 tornadoes were registered.
Twenty-five people were killed in Missouri and Kentucky, two in Virginia, and dozens were injured. Police say the death toll could rise.
At London-Corbin Airport in Laurel County, Kentucky, the storm left hangars twisted and flattened. One plane flipped over, and a medical helicopter was damaged. Airport Manager Matthew Singer said no workers were hurt, but several structures and buildings sustained significant damage.
In St. Louis, Missouri, authorities say cell phone towers were damaged, power was out in several neighborhoods, and homes and buildings were severely damaged. City Mayor Kara Spencer said preliminary estimates suggest about 5,000 buildings were damaged.
[UPI] May 17 (UPI) -- A manhunt is underway after an unknown number of shooters entered a tavern in Durban, South Africa, and killed eight people Friday night.
The mass shooting occurred in the Zama information settlement at U Section, Umlazi, the South African Police Service in KwaZulu-Natal, said Saturday in a news release.
"The victims were inside the dwelling when an unknown number of suspects entered and opened fire, killing them at the scene," the news release says.
"Investigations into the possible motive of the killings are underway, and police have launched a manhunt for the suspects."
Local police found six men and two women between ages 22 and 40 with multiple gunshot wounds lying dead in a pool of blood after receiving multiple calls about murders.
Durban is South Africa's main cargo port and is located on the northeastern coast of South Africa. About 4.2 million people live in the greater Durban area.
South Africa averages 75 murders every day and reported 6,953 murders from October to December in 2024.
Gangs often commit the murders, which sometimes target entire families or prominent people.
Gunmen killed a family of seven, including three children, in September and last month abducted a U.S. missionary while he was delivering a sermon at his church.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] At least 37 people have drowned in a ferry accident in southwestern Nigeria. This was reported by The Guardian.
Third World problems.
The tragedy occurred near Gbajigbo in Kwara State. According to available information, the vessel sank due to overload. Search and rescue operations are underway at the scene.
Eyewitness and survivor Salisu Danladi, who claimed to have swum to shore, said the tragedy happened three nights ago as they were returning from Niger State.
"I thank God that I survived, but the truth is that there were too many of us on the boat. We were desperate to get home because the day was long gone. It was that day that I realized the benefit of my swimming skills," he said.
[ZH] You know times are getting tough when grocery stores resort to good ole' fashion ripping off customers via mispricing.
Shoppers at Kroger-owned stores may be unknowingly paying more at checkout due to pricing errors, according to a Consumer Reports investigation with The Guardian and the Food and Environment Reporting Network.
Even if you don’t shop at Kroger, similar issues have been found at other retailers, according to Consumer Reports and NBC affiliate KCRA.
Investigators found expired sale tags on over 150 grocery items, leading to overcharges on products like beef, salmon, coffee, juice, vegetables, cough medicine, and dog food. "Imagine picking up an item on sale only to be charged full price at checkout. That's exactly what Consumer Reports says is happening at Kroger-owned stores across the country."
The investigation began after Kroger workers in Colorado, currently in union talks, reported widespread pricing problems. CR recruited shoppers to check 26 Kroger-owned stores in 14 states and D.C., finding overcharges averaging $1.70 per sale item, or 18.4% more. Workers blamed staffing cuts and reduced hours, saying it’s impossible to keep up with thousands of discount tags.
#2
Same at too many other stores.
We have taken to using our cell phone cameras, when there is not a sticker on the item, to photo the shelf listed prices.
#5
I caught a radio news update thing today, went something like, "Consumers confused and trying to come to terms, when after months of being told prices were going to skyrocket because of tariffs, prices remain stable."
#1
Oh noes! Another air traffic control breakdown. What could be the cause? The article does not say. Neither, apparently, do any of the other online articles (or my google fu is weak).
This suggests the cause of the breakdown is embarrassing. Not just a routine oopsie like the cleaning lady plugging in the vacuum and crashing the computers, or backhoe fade from construction of a new parking log. Could it be Green Energy Follies, like the recent crash in Spain do to lack of dispatchable power? Or possibly system failure do to lack of working backup-systems? Inquiring minds...
[FoxBusinessNews] Recent blackouts in Spain and Portugal highlight the need for reliable base power as Nordic countries rethink nuclear energy policies.
After four decades of Denmark’s ban on nuclear power, the country is now considering reversing its anti-atomic stance. And that move may be part of a big change in how electricity gets generated in Europe.
The Danes took note of the massive power outage last month that cut off electricity for the whole of Spain and neighboring Portugal plus some of southern France. The problem was that there was no reliable base power such as nuclear energy running on the grid at the time. Instead, those countries had to rely on frequently unstable renewable energy, such as solar and wind.
Yet when the blackout arrived, Spain’s Prime Minister categorically ruled out an overreliance on solar and other renewable energy as a reason for the grid crashing. Still increasing numbers of people don’t see it that way.
"Without nuclear, net-zero is impossible," Daniel Lacalle chief economist at Madrid-based investment company Tressis, told FOX Business. That’s because renewable energy such as solar or wind is not reliable enough to provide consistent energy.
All electricity grids need to have a so-called base-power that can be relied on, experts say. Historically, the base has been coal, natural gas and nuclear. But of those three, only nuclear produces carbon-free electricity.
Meanwhile, much of Europe’s population has been terrified of nuclear power for decades with anti-nuclear activists citing the disasters at Chernobyl, Ukraine and Fukushima, Japan. But Lacalle says there’s some good news for nuclear now.
Denmark isn’t the only Nordic country warming to nuclear power. In March, Sweden said the EU needs to push for nuclear power to ensure there is energy security. Likewise, Norway was already toying with the idea of small modular nuclear reactors. The Left in Europe always mentions the Nordic countries for everything, Lacalle says. "The fact that Denmark, Norway and Sweden are deciding to change policies, that is huge in terms of sentiment," he told FOX Business.
Near the end of the last decade, leading politicians in Europe began to embrace what’s commonly known as net-zero. It was an effort that refers to a change in energy use that results in having zero carbon emissions on a net basis. The prevailing view by many of Europe’s elites is that this reduction in carbon use will help slow warming of the earth.
[UK] shadow energy minister Andrew Bowie yesterday called on Labour's Secretary for Energy Security and Net Zero Ed Miliband to carry out an 'immediate pause and review' of its efforts to transition to green power.
[Breitbart] Unnamed sources in the Department of Justice (DOJ) are claiming the Trump administration is planning to gut safeguards that prevent politically motivated prosecutions — ironically, a safeguard that was not triggered by the prosecution of Donald Trump when he ran for president in 2024, supporters say.
Reports this weekend by the Washington Post and the Daily Beast allege Attorney General Pam Bondi is considering removing a requirement that an internal department group called the Public Integrity Section (PIN) sign off on any prosecutions of public officials, such as lawmakers and other elected officials.
The Post reported:
Federal prosecutors across the country may soon be able to indict members of Congress without approval from lawyers in the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section, according to three people familiar with a proposal attorneys in the section learned about last week. Under the proposal, investigators and prosecutors would also not be required to consult with the section’s attorneys during key steps of probes into public officials, altering a long-standing provision in the Justice Department’s manual that outlines how investigations of elected officials should be conducted.
A DOJ spokesman confirmed the proposal and said no final decisions have been made, according to the Post. The newspaper also reported that three people familiar with the proposal spoke on the condition of anonymity because “they fear reprisals.”
The ongoing controversy about politically motivated prosecutions has continued to unfold as a two-way street since Donald Trump took office.
Bondi is among the many Trump supporters and officials who have repeatedly accused the Biden administration of having weaponized the DOJ against Trump with politically motivated prosecutions in order to prevent him from running in 2024.
Unnamed sources who, along with other career prosecutors, remained quiet when the department and special counsel Jack Smith went after candidate Trump, are now implying the Trump administration is planning take down its enemies with federal prosecutions.
Cutting the Public Integrity Section out of the approval process would give appointed U.S. attorneys more power in bringing public corruption cases, Dan Schwager, a former Public Integrity Section attorney who now works in private practice, told the Post. He explained:
The reason you have the section is exactly what this administration says they want, which is stop politicization. That requires a respect and ability to understand how the laws have been applied in similar situations in the past. The only way to ensure that public officials on both sides of the aisle are treated similarly is to have as much institutional knowledge and experience as possible.
Ninety-three U.S. attorneys’ offices across the country handle many public corruption investigations and prosecutions in their jurisdictions, the Post article stated. “But, according to the Justice Department manual, which is posted online, the PIN section must still be consulted on key steps in those investigations,” the newspaper wrote.
The Daily Beast reported:
Since Trump took office, PIN has already been hollowed out, as have other DOJ offices. The 30 prosecutors working in the office at the end of the Biden administration have been cut to fewer than five. Several have resigned, been reassigned, or were fired after clashing with Bondi and other Trump appointees.
However, Aaron Reitz, Assistant Attorney General, said the new attorney general is cleaning house. Writing exclusively for Breitbart News last week, he wrote, “In short, AG Bondi assumed office with a monumental task: restoring a justice system rotted with left-wing weaponization and lawfare so that it might instead reflect the very best of American legal values, ideals, and standards. By any objective measure, she’s been extraordinarily successful.”
Controversy over the proposal comes after Trump-appointed acting U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, Alina Habba, earlier this month launched an investigation into a detention center riot that included immigration activists and three Democratic lawmakers and the arrest of Newark’s mayor, as reported by Breitbart News.
Vice President JD Vance also weighed in on the melee and the investigation, saying that being “a member of Congress doesn’t give you a right to obstruct the law.”
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] At least 17 people died in a fire that occurred in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad. This was reported by the agency ANI.
According to preliminary information, the cause of the fire was a short circuit.
What’s the Hindu version of inshallah?
Firefighters who arrived at the scene were unable to quickly put out the fire.
"The fire broke out in a pearl shop owned by a family. Their residence was one floor above the shop. Many people, including women and children, died in the fire. There are also injured people," said local government official Kishan Reddy.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed condolences to the families of the victims. It is specified that their relatives will be paid $2.3 thousand each. The injured will receive $580 each.
Commentary by Russian military journalist Boris Rozhin:
[ColonelCassad] Advertisement for the Chinese high-altitude strike UAV "Jiutian", which is expected to enter service with the PLA this summer.
Of interest (in addition to various suspended weapons), it is worth noting the declared ability to launch swarm kamikaze drones in clusters, which should automatically capture and destroy targets. For these purposes, two containers for batch launch of drones are built directly into the UAV body. The Chinese previously installed such containers on pickups and trucks.
Among the disadvantages, it is worth noting the large size, which makes the machine vulnerable to modern air defense systems. In a theater of military operations without serious air defense, such a machine will certainly punish.
I will assume that this is only a desired concept, and not a ready-made system, although the Chinese have been experimenting with this topic since the mid-10s. Then experiments were conducted with a mass drop of drones from a military transport. When technical problems (communication, guidance, coordination, range) are solved, swarm drones with a batch launch will become the new standard.
Well, large drones launching a bunch of small drones that can distinguish between a person, heavy, light armored vehicles, artillery, other drones - this is an approach to the very future (not the brightest), which was described by science fiction writers predicting the robotization of war.
It is necessary to dig in this direction now, so as not to find ourselves in a situation identical to the beginning of the SVO, when it turned out that the unmanned revolution was not fully understood in our country.
#2
Too big to lose? The ideal niche for a drone is small, cheap and deployable in large numbers. And for missions that are too hazardous for humans -- like the robots sent into the ruins of the Chernobyl reactor.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[FOX] Former President Joe Biden's office confirmed on Sunday that he was diagnosed with an "aggressive form" of prostate cancer.
