Federal prosecutors in Massachusetts on Thursday launched a new team they said would “actively and aggressively” go after benefit as well as voter fraud in the state.
Teasing dozens of investigations already underway, U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said she sees “insufficient guardrails in place in Massachusetts to address the rampant benefit fraud across the state.” Her office has charged 15 people with nearly $9 million in public benefits fraud since December.
A pair of assistant U.S. attorneys, Philip Mallard and Mark Grady, will lead the new Benefit and Voter Fraud Team as it investigates cases involving MassHealth, the SNAP food stamp program, childcare subsidies and voting. The effort also features a hotline (1-855-SCAM-MA-1) where members of the public can report suspected benefits fraud.
The announcement comes after President Donald Trump announced a “war on fraud” in his State of the Union this year, specifically naming Massachusetts as well as Maine and California.
On Beacon Hill, the five Republican state senators last month called for an oversight hearing to examine what they called “significant and recurring evidence of SNAP EBT fraud, operational failures” at the state’s Department of Transitional assistance, and “the Commonwealth’s inability to adequately protect taxpayer funds and program beneficiaries.”
The Republican senators cited a report from state Auditor Diana DiZoglio, which found about $12 million in public benefits fraud in fiscal 2025, along with two recent cases out of Foley’s office.
Foley in December charged two men with trafficking nearly $7 million in SNAP food stamp benefits through a pair of Mattapan variety shops they owned. And in February, her office announced charges against three others who allegedly used more than 100 stolen identities to collect a total of more than $1 million in SNAP and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance benefits from Massachusetts and other states.
Earlier Thursday, Foley’s office charged another nine people for allegedly stealing more than $900,000 in SNAP, Social Security and MassHealth benefits. The defendants are accused of using stolen identities to get government-issued IDs and then apply for public benefits.
“This is the tip of the iceberg,” Foley said in a statement. “We have dozens of investigations in the pipeline that will come to fruition in the coming weeks.”
A spokesperson for Gov. Maura Healey said the governor is focused on punishing fraud and that all state programs will continue their work to identify and prosecute bad actors.
“Less than 1 percent of SNAP caseload has been found to have committed fraud, and [the Department of Transitional Assistance] is working with our state and federal partners to get that number even lower,” spokesperson Jacqueline Manning said in a statement. “Additionally, MassHealth has one of the country’s most robust programs to aggressively fight fraud, waste, and abuse — which includes conducting over 1,200 audits and saving taxpayers over $600 million over the past three years.”
The press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office announcing the Benefit and Voter Fraud Team highlighted the recent benefits cases but did not mention specific instances of voter fraud in Massachusetts.
Last month, Foley’s office announced that a Colombian woman living in Boston without lawful immigration status had been convicted for using a stolen identity to receive more than $400,000 in federal benefits and to vote in the 2024 presidential election.
Massachusetts Secretary of State Bill Galvin, the state’s elections overseer, said Foley’s office had not reached out to him about the new team and that “obviously, any type of fraud is unacceptable.”
“Our office has always enjoyed a good working relationship with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in previous administrations, and I hope that relationship will continue,” Galvin said in a statement to GBH News.
