Vice President JD Vance stood before a Bangor crowd Thursday and delivered what amounted to a state-by-state indictment of government negligence, with Maine squarely in his crosshairs.
Speaking at Bangor International Airport, Vance unloaded a litany of fraud cases that he said have drained taxpayer dollars for decades while elected officials turned a blind eye.
Vance chairs the Trump administration’s anti-fraud task force, a role that has taken him across the country to spotlight what he calls systemic abuse of federal programs.
He did not mince words about Maine’s standing in that national picture, ranking the state third in the country for fraud — a distinction he framed in athletic terms.
“Outside of Minnesota and California, which are probably number one and number two, if they’re the gold medalist and the silver medalist … maybe Maine is the bronze medalist,” Vance told the crowd.
When an audience member shouted out New York, Vance allowed that the Empire State may also have a legitimate claim to that third-place spot.
The cases Vance described were striking in their specifics.
He spoke of stolen identities being weaponized to collect hospice benefits, of people showing up to collect government assistance while stepping out of luxury vehicles, and of deceased individuals whose names keep appearing on food stamp rolls long after their deaths.
“It’s unbelievable how much you have been fleeced by your own government over the past 15, 20, 30 years,” he told the audience. “Nobody was looking at this.”
Vance pushed back hard against any characterization of fraud as a harmless or abstract offense, arguing that real people bear the consequences — both the taxpayers footing the bill and the individuals whose stolen identities become instruments of crime.
“Fraud is exactly what happens when you’ve got a government that is not fighting for the American people, but is fighting for fraudsters and illegal aliens. And it had to stop,” he said.
One case anchored much of Vance’s remarks. He described Rakiya Mohamed, an illegal immigrant who billed Medicaid for interpretation services she claimed to have provided to immigrants across Maine.
Federal investigators determined she had provided no services at all.
“You know what she was actually doing? Providing zero services and collecting that $15 million over a five-year period that was going directly into her pocket,” Vance said. Mohamed has since been convicted.
Vance laid responsibility for Maine’s fraud problem directly at the feet of two Democrats: outgoing Governor Janet Mills and former President Joe Biden.
“You ask yourself, why did Maine go from a state that did not have a serious fraud problem to one where I can honestly say it’s one of the worst states in the union? And I’ll give you two answers and two politicians: Number one is Janet Mills, and number two is Joe Biden,” he said. “And thankfully, one of them has already been kicked to the curb, and one is on her way out the door, exactly as it should be.”
By contrast, Vance reserved some of his strongest praise for Republican former Governor Paul LePage, whom he credited with doubling fraud investigations, requiring photographs on EBT cards to confirm recipient identities, and targeting international fraud networks operating inside the state.
He called LePage “the biggest advocate for your tax dollars and the biggest threat to fraudsters that ever existed in the state of Maine.”
LePage is currently running for Maine’s Second Congressional District, a seat held by Democrat Jared Golden. Vance indicated the administration wants LePage carrying the anti-fraud fight to Washington.
Mills, Vance noted, has also blocked local law enforcement from working alongside federal authorities to remove criminal illegal aliens from the state — a policy he tied directly to the fraud problem metastasizing under her watch.
He called it “preposterous” that state government has withheld cooperation from federal fraud investigators even as tens of millions in abuse have come to light.
Vance pointed to independent journalist Nick Shirley’s investigative work exposing fraud in Minnesota as a model for what citizen reporting can accomplish, and he urged Maine residents to come forward with tips of their own.
He closed with a message that crossed party lines, arguing that rooting out fraud “should not be a red state or a blue state issue,” and called on all state governments to join the administration’s effort — adding that the administration remains ready to work with Maine’s governor if she chooses cooperation over obstruction.
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