July 10, 2026 • 16 mins
Katy Grimes (California Globe) talks to Jack Armstrong about the federal investigation into CA Governor Gavin Newsom & his wife. Plus, a investigation in CA reveals a massive amount of medical fraud.
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Us considering playing this report about Doge.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
You remember Doge that Elon Musk led and the goal
was to cut waste in government and all that sort
of stuff. Well we're talking. We're about to talk about
the unbelievable waste we've got, for instance, in California with
tax payer money, and I'm sure it's true in lots
of other states. And it's federal dollars, So it matters
a lot of it is federal dollars, and it matters
(00:24):
to all of you out there. We'll talk about that
in a second, but right now, I'd like to welcome
to the show. Katie Grimes, the editor in chief of
the California Globe. Katie's a longtime investigative journalist covered in
California state capital.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Katie, how are you today, Hi?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Jack? Doing well? Thank you?
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Before we get to this unbelievable welfare fraud story, how
much trouble is Gavin and his wife in with this?
Where did their money come from? Scandal? Is this a
real story?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
I do believe it.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Is a real story, and it's because this this kind
of nonprofit in geo scandal has been building for a
long time.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Frankly, some years.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Ago, like two thousand and six, twenty ten. I was
reporting fraudulent nonprofits to the California Attorney General back then,
and that was when Jerry Brown was still agy and
nothing ever happened. And then we watched them just exponentially
grow and they become like this, this shadow government in
California where tons of taxpayer money goes into them. Reporters
(01:33):
like me, that's where it stops, because public records requests,
you know, stop at the door of the nonprofit. And
it's just been this massive, just this is this black
market spending almost and unfortunately we've been reporting, and many
(01:54):
other news outlets in the stay have been reporting on
the news thumbs on the first part partners easy nonprofits.
Besides just you know, kind of the filth that she
produces and then requires public schools to buy these weird videos.
They've you know, she's been taking a lot of money
(02:14):
out of these nonprofits as well. And I think it
could be almost like the textbookcase for as a warning
shot across the bow to a lot of other politicians
who are tied into nonprofits.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
Yeah, they need to outlaw the term nonprofit because it's
just ridiculous and I can't believe people fell for it
for so long. Hopefully, uh, that is coming to an end.
Just the brief version is you start a nonprofit, you
called a nonprofit, and no, you don't show any profits,
but you bring in lots of money, and you know
(02:48):
some of your expenditures are well you or you need
a salary as the person who runs a nonprofit, it
turns out your salary is way more than you'd make
in the private sector doing something. And of course you
need a car to draw even though in the modern
world very few people get cars anymore. You're going to
have a car, and you travel a lot, and you
know you have to stay. You shouldn't stay have to
(03:09):
stay in a motel six, you should have to stay
in a decent hotel.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Blob blab blab meals trips.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Vacations, salaries, all kinds of crap, and you call it
a nonprofit.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
When I go digging into the irs forums that nonprofits
have to file every year, you cannot believe the expenditures
for travel conferences. I mean hundreds of thousands of dollars
for some of the smallest nonprofits. It's just this lifestyle
money that is being so abused and you know, unfortunately,
they're making it bad for the legitimate nonprofits that have
(03:44):
been around a long time.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
I'm providing you.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
Know, actual cancer services or research.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Or things like that.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
I think the whole thing should be scrapped and if
you're legitimate, reapply and start over.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yeah, I would agree with that.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It'd be something if Gavin Newsom and his wife actually
either their timing was wrong or they pushed it too
farcas so many politicians been doing this for so long.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
Oh yeah, I mean, we had city council members in
Sacramento where I live who had their own nonprofits and
they were totally tapped into the city budgets. And we'd
write about it and people was kind of yawn and
scratch and look away. You know.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
It's just like it never caught on that this was fraud.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
The number of politicians that live lifestyles of the super
rich is amazing. And I'll include Trump was rich already,
but he and his family are getting rich off all
kinds of different things. But the whole Biden crime family
thing that they had gone the Clinton Foundation, it's just
it's just something you do.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
Yeah, the Clinton seem to have perfected it because we
watched nonprofits just explode after the Clinton Global Initiative was done,
and I think a lot of other politicians were emboldened
by that and kind of modeled theirs after what the
Clinton's did.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
So this scandal, because you know, the Trump Justice Department
goes after Gavin Newsom, it looks like you know what
it looks like. But you think there is plenty of
there there that this could this could turn out to
be a problem for Gavin wanting to run for president.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Oh absolutely, I really do.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
It's just you know, so in addition to their their
weird non her Missus Newson's weird nonprofits. Remember the Newsoans
have these two homes that they did not purchase but
were eventually.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Gifted to that because we all live that way, right,
we all have homes given to us, several homes.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
That's that's a normal lifestyle.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
And and the LLC that was created two separate LLCs,
but they just were formed the day before the homes closed.
The homes they live in now in marin is a
nine million dollar home. The one they still have in
Sacramento is three point eight million dollars. And they didn't
buy either one of us. So there's a lot of
weirdness around the Newsom's lifestyle, including remember during COVID I
(06:06):
reported that they were caught taking a trip to Cabo
San Lucas. Okay, whatever, It sounds like, no big deal,
except that they stayed in a twenty six thousand dollars
a night dhaka.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
Twenty six thousand dollars a.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Night, yes, owned by some Russian oligarchs that was clearly
gifted to them.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Well you don't, you don't do that for nothing in return? Exactly, God,
that's a why that's now, that's luxurious. I can't even
imagine what that looks like.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
And then I think it was A California Post had
the story last week of the timing of so many
of these appointments where somebody would give a bunch of
money to Newsome one of their nonprofits, and then two
days later they'd get named the blah blah blah blah
blah blah.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Always.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Yeah, there's a lot of quid pro quo going around,
and I'm sure all of it's being looked at, not
just Missus Newsom's nonprofits.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
I am.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
I don't know if cynical's a right word, might be
I feel like this happens so often and nothing ever
comes of it. I just my expectations for the people
get away with this sort of crap over and over again.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Yeah, I know the frustration because I write a lot
about it, my research a lot about it, and we
rarely see anything happen. I think though, that there's so
much of this garbage going on in California. I mean,
the Somali fraud up in in Minnesota is one thing,
but boy, when that was discovered, those of us in
(07:36):
California who are aware of fraud, Oh yeah, hold my beer.
Watch what California does.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
That is a great tease, Katie Grimes, because this is
what I want to do on to take a break
and come back and get into your story about the
undercover LA raid that exposed California's multi million dollar welfare fraud,
tons of money being stolen. God, the fact that may
Or Mom dies the other day, put out that video
(08:02):
he said, children go hungry in America while Elon Musk's
hunger only grows for more power and money. When you
see all this money that's being stolen in the Snap
food programs, unbelievabok. Katie Grimes will explain it all to
us coming up. Stay tuned, he.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Again.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
Mayor Mondani. His response to Trump for fourth of July
was this video. He put out, we need to talk
more about later. He mentioned all the kids going to
bed hungry in this country, how awful it is we
have a trillionaire when kids are going to bed hungry.
If your kid is going to bed hungry, you are
not good at figuring out where the food is. Because,
for instance, in California, the Snap food program the largest
(08:48):
in the country, twelve point five billion dollars twelve point
five billion dollars the Snap food program for one state. Anyway,
there's a lot of fraud going on. There was a
raid Thursday, July third, so the day before and fourth
of July got lost in the news flow. That's why
we have Katie Grimes on today to tell us about it. Katie,
(09:08):
what happened show?
Speaker 4 (09:10):
This was a kind of multi agency raid. It was
the US Department of Agriculture was involved, Homeland Security was involved,
LAPD was involved, and Assistant US Attorney bill Is Saley
from the Central District in LA was involved. And what
was going on.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
So they did this big raid at a Snap.
Speaker 4 (09:33):
Food stamp benefits.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Store in skid Row in LA.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
And as we know, this is you know, the Trump
administration said they were going to crack down on fraud
in general, but you know, especially federally funded programs that
are experiencing we'll say a lot of fraud like this,
and welfare fraud is one of the worst. As you said,
we have twelve point five billion in our SNAP, which
(10:02):
is food stamps program in California. Eleven percent of the
program's payments are fraudulent. They're issued in error, meaning there's
either duplicates or there are people from out of state
or out of the country. I mean, eleven percent fraud out.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Of twelve point five billion is an.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Awful lot of money.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
So, and this was just one of six raids on
July third. So what happened? Wash and the California Post
exclusively reported this. They did an incredible job. Six stores
were charged with selling SNAP food stamp benefits in exchange
for cash, while they say another twenty seven stores were
(10:44):
charged with exchanging SNAP benefits for all kinds of prohibitive
ideas meeting you know, alcohol, beer, vaping.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Devices, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (10:53):
Part of the reason I thought that this was so
interesting as well as prog is that our California budget,
one third of it is made up of federal funding.
And this, I say, this is why Gavin Newsom is
losing his mind over federal funding cuts and why he
(11:13):
and our Attorney General Robanta continues suing the Trump administration.
It's over these a lot of these funding cuts. But
what's even more interesting is almost four and five federal
dollars dollars that flow through our budget currently right now
support health and human services.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
So it's all this low.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
Income food stamp welfare, you know, the multi layers of programs,
and those are the ones that the Trump administration is
looking at for fraud.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
And you mentioned DOGE earlier.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Remember when Elon Musk and his Doge team had been
at it for a few months, he came out and
said he thinks that half of the federal budget with fraud.
And if we could just uncover and expose and get
rid of all the frauds, that Americans wouldn't have to
pay income taxes.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Right, that tells you how.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Bad it is, Right, it's depressing. It is just depressing. Again,
my belief that will make much headway in eliminating this
fraud is not very high, which maybe I'm too cynical,
but like you said, we saw what happened in Minnesota.
(12:29):
In California was like hold my food stamps and went
even bigger. So the reason people want to exchange their
Snap stuff for cash is so that you can buy
because you're not supposed to be able to buy cigarettes
and pop and vape pens and everything else with Snap benefits.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
We did a story in June on a federal report
that was issued by the US Department of Health and
Human Services, and it revealed this is stunning, California receives
eighty percent of all of the federal funding for illegal
immigrant families, which is also part of this welfare money
wow in the entire country. Yeah, so in the entire country,
(13:12):
California gets eighty percent of it. So naturally the federal
government is looking at California and number one, why we're
getting so much and it shouldn't be going to illegal immigrants,
but it does, and you know how much of that
is fraud.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
In addition, so.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Those of you who are listening across the country don't
live in California, you have a reason to care about this.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Other states, other people who live.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
In other states, because you know, we live in California
and in very vote for this crap.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
I don't vote for it, but enough people do.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
But the federal dollars those who live in other responsible states,
you should be very angry at California for wasting your money.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
Yeah, I totally agree, and especially when you hear Gavin Newsom.
You know both thing that California sends more to the
federal government than it takes. All of these numbers that
I just shared with you prove that that's total BF.
We're taking a lot more than we're creating.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I wish I had the time to do this because
I was really angry about Mamdani's speech the other day
where he had that line about kids go to bed
hungry in this country while Elon Musk only hungers for
more money in power. There are so many different programs
at every level of your city, county, and state and
(14:33):
federal money. Then you're just not trying very hard to
get food for your kids.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 4 (14:40):
And for the politicians that continually shriek about our children
are going to bed hungry.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
If you've walked by a.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
California elementary school anytime recently.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I noticed that the majority of the kids are overweight.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that is something. Well, keep uncovering
the fraud. I mean, at least we can scream about it.
I don't, like I said, I'm not optimistic that anything
good will happen, but that is absolutely amazing. Eleven percent
of twelve plus billion dollars we know is wasted, and
it could be more than that.
Speaker 4 (15:15):
Yeah, it's it's disheartening, definitely, but yes, I will definitely
stay on this.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Thank you, Katie Grimes, the editor in chief of the
California Globe, appreciate your time today. Those stories are just
so dang maddening and explains how you can walk by
somebody on the street who looks down and out, but
they got an iPhone and they're they're getting by, they're
doing all right. We've got so many different programs with
(15:41):
so much money sloshing around, and then you can trade
in your your government card or whatever you have so
you can buy booze and cigarettes and vake pens and
whatever the heck you want to buy.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
It's just so depressing.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
You get up and go to work every day to
try to earn money. You have to give over way
too much the government and then it gets wasted on
this crap. Children going to bed hungry at night while
Elon musk On lay hungers for more power and money.
You freaking socialists in your line of crap. I got
(16:17):
more on that coming up a little bit later.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
I will get too. Drives me nuts.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
We're war with Iran again. I don't know if you're
following the news in the last twenty four hours. Trump
said the m Olu, the ceasefire, that whole thing is over.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
We'll play that for you.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
That all happened while you were asleep last night, and
that's a pretty big deal if the war is back on.
We talked to Mike Leines about that earlier. I'll summarize
a little a little bit of that when we come
back next. Trump is meeting with NATO right now, and
there's been news made since we went on the air today.
We'll have the very latest if you miss it. Gets
the podcast Armstrong and Getty on demand.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Armstrong and Getty
Us considering playing this report about Doge.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
You remember Doge that Elon Musk led and the goal
was to cut waste in government and all that sort
of stuff. Well we're talking. We're about to talk about
the unbelievable waste we've got, for instance, in California with
tax payer money, and I'm sure it's true in lots
of other states. And it's federal dollars, So it matters
a lot of it is federal dollars, and it matters
(00:24):
to all of you out there. We'll talk about that
in a second, but right now, I'd like to welcome
to the show. Katie Grimes, the editor in chief of
the California Globe. Katie's a longtime investigative journalist covered in
California state capital.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Katie, how are you today, Hi?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Jack? Doing well? Thank you?
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Before we get to this unbelievable welfare fraud story, how
much trouble is Gavin and his wife in with this?
Where did their money come from? Scandal? Is this a
real story?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
I do believe it.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Is a real story, and it's because this this kind
of nonprofit in geo scandal has been building for a
long time.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Frankly, some years.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Ago, like two thousand and six, twenty ten. I was
reporting fraudulent nonprofits to the California Attorney General back then,
and that was when Jerry Brown was still agy and
nothing ever happened. And then we watched them just exponentially
grow and they become like this, this shadow government in
California where tons of taxpayer money goes into them. Reporters
(01:33):
like me, that's where it stops, because public records requests,
you know, stop at the door of the nonprofit. And
it's just been this massive, just this is this black
market spending almost and unfortunately we've been reporting, and many
(01:54):
other news outlets in the stay have been reporting on
the news thumbs on the first part partners easy nonprofits.
Besides just you know, kind of the filth that she
produces and then requires public schools to buy these weird videos.
They've you know, she's been taking a lot of money
(02:14):
out of these nonprofits as well. And I think it
could be almost like the textbookcase for as a warning
shot across the bow to a lot of other politicians
who are tied into nonprofits.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
Yeah, they need to outlaw the term nonprofit because it's
just ridiculous and I can't believe people fell for it
for so long. Hopefully, uh, that is coming to an end.
Just the brief version is you start a nonprofit, you
called a nonprofit, and no, you don't show any profits,
but you bring in lots of money, and you know
(02:48):
some of your expenditures are well you or you need
a salary as the person who runs a nonprofit, it
turns out your salary is way more than you'd make
in the private sector doing something. And of course you
need a car to draw even though in the modern
world very few people get cars anymore. You're going to
have a car, and you travel a lot, and you
know you have to stay. You shouldn't stay have to
(03:09):
stay in a motel six, you should have to stay
in a decent hotel.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Blob blab blab meals trips.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Vacations, salaries, all kinds of crap, and you call it
a nonprofit.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
When I go digging into the irs forums that nonprofits
have to file every year, you cannot believe the expenditures
for travel conferences. I mean hundreds of thousands of dollars
for some of the smallest nonprofits. It's just this lifestyle
money that is being so abused and you know, unfortunately,
they're making it bad for the legitimate nonprofits that have
(03:44):
been around a long time.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
I'm providing you.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
Know, actual cancer services or research.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Or things like that.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
I think the whole thing should be scrapped and if
you're legitimate, reapply and start over.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yeah, I would agree with that.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It'd be something if Gavin Newsom and his wife actually
either their timing was wrong or they pushed it too
farcas so many politicians been doing this for so long.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
Oh yeah, I mean, we had city council members in
Sacramento where I live who had their own nonprofits and
they were totally tapped into the city budgets. And we'd
write about it and people was kind of yawn and
scratch and look away. You know.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
It's just like it never caught on that this was fraud.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
The number of politicians that live lifestyles of the super
rich is amazing. And I'll include Trump was rich already,
but he and his family are getting rich off all
kinds of different things. But the whole Biden crime family
thing that they had gone the Clinton Foundation, it's just
it's just something you do.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
Yeah, the Clinton seem to have perfected it because we
watched nonprofits just explode after the Clinton Global Initiative was done,
and I think a lot of other politicians were emboldened
by that and kind of modeled theirs after what the
Clinton's did.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
So this scandal, because you know, the Trump Justice Department
goes after Gavin Newsom, it looks like you know what
it looks like. But you think there is plenty of
there there that this could this could turn out to
be a problem for Gavin wanting to run for president.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Oh absolutely, I really do.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
It's just you know, so in addition to their their
weird non her Missus Newson's weird nonprofits. Remember the Newsoans
have these two homes that they did not purchase but
were eventually.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Gifted to that because we all live that way, right,
we all have homes given to us, several homes.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
That's that's a normal lifestyle.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
And and the LLC that was created two separate LLCs,
but they just were formed the day before the homes closed.
The homes they live in now in marin is a
nine million dollar home. The one they still have in
Sacramento is three point eight million dollars. And they didn't
buy either one of us. So there's a lot of
weirdness around the Newsom's lifestyle, including remember during COVID I
(06:06):
reported that they were caught taking a trip to Cabo
San Lucas. Okay, whatever, It sounds like, no big deal,
except that they stayed in a twenty six thousand dollars
a night dhaka.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
Twenty six thousand dollars a.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Night, yes, owned by some Russian oligarchs that was clearly
gifted to them.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Well you don't, you don't do that for nothing in return? Exactly, God,
that's a why that's now, that's luxurious. I can't even
imagine what that looks like.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
And then I think it was A California Post had
the story last week of the timing of so many
of these appointments where somebody would give a bunch of
money to Newsome one of their nonprofits, and then two
days later they'd get named the blah blah blah blah
blah blah.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Always.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Yeah, there's a lot of quid pro quo going around,
and I'm sure all of it's being looked at, not
just Missus Newsom's nonprofits.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
I am.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
I don't know if cynical's a right word, might be
I feel like this happens so often and nothing ever
comes of it. I just my expectations for the people
get away with this sort of crap over and over again.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Yeah, I know the frustration because I write a lot
about it, my research a lot about it, and we
rarely see anything happen. I think though, that there's so
much of this garbage going on in California. I mean,
the Somali fraud up in in Minnesota is one thing,
but boy, when that was discovered, those of us in
(07:36):
California who are aware of fraud, Oh yeah, hold my beer.
Watch what California does.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
That is a great tease, Katie Grimes, because this is
what I want to do on to take a break
and come back and get into your story about the
undercover LA raid that exposed California's multi million dollar welfare fraud,
tons of money being stolen. God, the fact that may
Or Mom dies the other day, put out that video
(08:02):
he said, children go hungry in America while Elon Musk's
hunger only grows for more power and money. When you
see all this money that's being stolen in the Snap
food programs, unbelievabok. Katie Grimes will explain it all to
us coming up. Stay tuned, he.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Again.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
Mayor Mondani. His response to Trump for fourth of July
was this video. He put out, we need to talk
more about later. He mentioned all the kids going to
bed hungry in this country, how awful it is we
have a trillionaire when kids are going to bed hungry.
If your kid is going to bed hungry, you are
not good at figuring out where the food is. Because,
for instance, in California, the Snap food program the largest
(08:48):
in the country, twelve point five billion dollars twelve point
five billion dollars the Snap food program for one state. Anyway,
there's a lot of fraud going on. There was a
raid Thursday, July third, so the day before and fourth
of July got lost in the news flow. That's why
we have Katie Grimes on today to tell us about it. Katie,
(09:08):
what happened show?
Speaker 4 (09:10):
This was a kind of multi agency raid. It was
the US Department of Agriculture was involved, Homeland Security was involved,
LAPD was involved, and Assistant US Attorney bill Is Saley
from the Central District in LA was involved. And what
was going on.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
So they did this big raid at a Snap.
Speaker 4 (09:33):
Food stamp benefits.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Store in skid Row in LA.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
And as we know, this is you know, the Trump
administration said they were going to crack down on fraud
in general, but you know, especially federally funded programs that
are experiencing we'll say a lot of fraud like this,
and welfare fraud is one of the worst. As you said,
we have twelve point five billion in our SNAP, which
(10:02):
is food stamps program in California. Eleven percent of the
program's payments are fraudulent. They're issued in error, meaning there's
either duplicates or there are people from out of state
or out of the country. I mean, eleven percent fraud out.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Of twelve point five billion is an.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Awful lot of money.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
So, and this was just one of six raids on
July third. So what happened? Wash and the California Post
exclusively reported this. They did an incredible job. Six stores
were charged with selling SNAP food stamp benefits in exchange
for cash, while they say another twenty seven stores were
(10:44):
charged with exchanging SNAP benefits for all kinds of prohibitive
ideas meeting you know, alcohol, beer, vaping.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Devices, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (10:53):
Part of the reason I thought that this was so
interesting as well as prog is that our California budget,
one third of it is made up of federal funding.
And this, I say, this is why Gavin Newsom is
losing his mind over federal funding cuts and why he
(11:13):
and our Attorney General Robanta continues suing the Trump administration.
It's over these a lot of these funding cuts. But
what's even more interesting is almost four and five federal
dollars dollars that flow through our budget currently right now
support health and human services.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
So it's all this low.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
Income food stamp welfare, you know, the multi layers of programs,
and those are the ones that the Trump administration is
looking at for fraud.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
And you mentioned DOGE earlier.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Remember when Elon Musk and his Doge team had been
at it for a few months, he came out and
said he thinks that half of the federal budget with fraud.
And if we could just uncover and expose and get
rid of all the frauds, that Americans wouldn't have to
pay income taxes.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Right, that tells you how.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Bad it is, Right, it's depressing. It is just depressing. Again,
my belief that will make much headway in eliminating this
fraud is not very high, which maybe I'm too cynical,
but like you said, we saw what happened in Minnesota.
(12:29):
In California was like hold my food stamps and went
even bigger. So the reason people want to exchange their
Snap stuff for cash is so that you can buy
because you're not supposed to be able to buy cigarettes
and pop and vape pens and everything else with Snap benefits.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
We did a story in June on a federal report
that was issued by the US Department of Health and
Human Services, and it revealed this is stunning, California receives
eighty percent of all of the federal funding for illegal
immigrant families, which is also part of this welfare money
wow in the entire country. Yeah, so in the entire country,
(13:12):
California gets eighty percent of it. So naturally the federal
government is looking at California and number one, why we're
getting so much and it shouldn't be going to illegal immigrants,
but it does, and you know how much of that
is fraud.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
In addition, so.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Those of you who are listening across the country don't
live in California, you have a reason to care about this.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Other states, other people who live.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
In other states, because you know, we live in California
and in very vote for this crap.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
I don't vote for it, but enough people do.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
But the federal dollars those who live in other responsible states,
you should be very angry at California for wasting your money.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
Yeah, I totally agree, and especially when you hear Gavin Newsom.
You know both thing that California sends more to the
federal government than it takes. All of these numbers that
I just shared with you prove that that's total BF.
We're taking a lot more than we're creating.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I wish I had the time to do this because
I was really angry about Mamdani's speech the other day
where he had that line about kids go to bed
hungry in this country while Elon Musk only hungers for
more money in power. There are so many different programs
at every level of your city, county, and state and
(14:33):
federal money. Then you're just not trying very hard to
get food for your kids.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 4 (14:40):
And for the politicians that continually shriek about our children
are going to bed hungry.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
If you've walked by a.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
California elementary school anytime recently.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I noticed that the majority of the kids are overweight.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that is something. Well, keep uncovering
the fraud. I mean, at least we can scream about it.
I don't, like I said, I'm not optimistic that anything
good will happen, but that is absolutely amazing. Eleven percent
of twelve plus billion dollars we know is wasted, and
it could be more than that.
Speaker 4 (15:15):
Yeah, it's it's disheartening, definitely, but yes, I will definitely
stay on this.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Thank you, Katie Grimes, the editor in chief of the
California Globe, appreciate your time today. Those stories are just
so dang maddening and explains how you can walk by
somebody on the street who looks down and out, but
they got an iPhone and they're they're getting by, they're
doing all right. We've got so many different programs with
(15:41):
so much money sloshing around, and then you can trade
in your your government card or whatever you have so
you can buy booze and cigarettes and vake pens and
whatever the heck you want to buy.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
It's just so depressing.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
You get up and go to work every day to
try to earn money. You have to give over way
too much the government and then it gets wasted on
this crap. Children going to bed hungry at night while
Elon musk On lay hungers for more power and money.
You freaking socialists in your line of crap. I got
(16:17):
more on that coming up a little bit later.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
I will get too. Drives me nuts.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
We're war with Iran again. I don't know if you're
following the news in the last twenty four hours. Trump
said the m Olu, the ceasefire, that whole thing is over.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
We'll play that for you.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
That all happened while you were asleep last night, and
that's a pretty big deal if the war is back on.
We talked to Mike Leines about that earlier. I'll summarize
a little a little bit of that when we come
back next. Trump is meeting with NATO right now, and
there's been news made since we went on the air today.
We'll have the very latest if you miss it. Gets
the podcast Armstrong and Getty on demand.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Armstrong and Getty
Hosts And Creators
Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
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