Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) said on FOX News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle” that widespread fraud, illegal immigration, and welfare benefits for non-citizens are demoralizing to the public, adding that confronting this abuse “is an opportunity to regain the trust of the American people and go after this fraud.” Schmitt called on people to be denaturalized and deported over alleged widespread fraud in the Minneapolis childcare system.

FMR. REP. JASON CHAFFETZ, FOX NEWS HOST: Well, it’s not just Minnesota. Similar allegations of fraud are popping up in other states across the country. In Maine, the state suspended more than a million dollars in taxpayer money to a nonprofit that serves immigrants over suspected fraud… Here with us is Missouri Senator Eric Schmidt. Senator, look, prior to your life there in the United States Senate, you’ve been an Attorney General. I think you can see, smell fraud, waste, and abuse. I got to tell you, I served in Congress for eight years. I think Congress is pretty inept at this point. They never stand up for themselves. I do not understand, Senator, why you can’t use the power of the purse. That’s the only power that the United States Congress really has. I never see him use it, ever, to just say, screw it. We’re not giving you all these billions of dollars. It never happens. SEN. ERIC SCHMITT (R-MO): Well, I agree, and I think, you know, in the intro here, there’s two issues. The first is, we’re seeing, I think just sadly, the tip of the iceberg of this fraud from these Somali strongholds in the United States. It’s in Minnesota, you’ve talked about Maine, you’ve talked about Ohio. This is a scam that reaches far and wide, and I’m kind of tired of the talk. This is a broader legal immigration problem. We talk a lot about illegal immigration, but this is a legal immigration problem. So, from my perspective, under 18 U.S.C. 1343, the wire fraud statute, there ought to be prosecutions immediately. Every visa that can be revoked should be revoked. Every deportation that should happen should happen right away, and in some cases where necessary, denaturalization should happen. A strong signal should be sent to immigrant communities that if you’re going to come here and fleece the American taxpayer, we’re actually going to prioritize taxpayers over this toxic empathy that’s dominated the Democrat party. Secondly, you talked about some of the COVID fraud abuse. The Biden administration, Jason, pushed so much money out the door for causes and issues that were never related to COVID. I think you’re going to see another wave of this fraud, and you have to have state AGs who are serious about it, and hopefully President Trump’s U.S. attorneys, when those state AGs don’t step up, do it as well. But I think Congress certainly plays a role, but we’re kind of, I’m sort of done with the talking. This is about prosecutions now. This is about putting people in jail. They’ve taken billions of dollars, billions of dollars. CHAFFETZ: Yeah, I want to see people in handcuffs. I want to see them prosecuted, and I want to see them on planes going back to their home countries as soon as possible, or put them on a bus. I don’t know, I always have to fly them. Put them on one of those old Greyhounds from 1972. That should do the trick. All right, a new HUD report, Housing and Urban Development. It reports that more than $ 5 billion dollars in questionable rental assistance during the final year of the Biden administration, and get this, it includes 30,000 deceased tenants and thousands of potential non-citizens. I mean, every day, every hour, we seem to get these reports. 30,000 dead people, Senator. SCHMITT: Well, I think that the main focus, when President Trump shocked the political world, right, and had the most historic return we’ve ever seen in American politics, from the moment he came down the escalator the first time, to his return to Washington, what was a central plank of his, is to take on the illegal immigration problem. So we kind of don’t talk about anymore that the southern border has been closed, right? Now he’s taking to the narco-terrorists on the high seas. But now I think the next phase of all this is the mass deportations that need to happen to meet the mass migration that was opened up by Joe Biden, the 20 million people. Then also these, you know, through the legal immigration problem we have, the H-1B visas that are displacing American workers, the OPT program that are displacing American students, this is part of an immigration system that is tilted against the American people. And when you see the fraud, when you see people getting cash to come here, no background checks, being put up at the Roosevelt Hotel, you know, the welfare benefits they’re going to non-citizens, if you’re, you know, a working-class American that sees this, you’re right to be frustrated with your government, and I think this is an opportunity to regain the trust of the American people and go after this fraud.

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