{"id":7758,"date":"2026-07-16T15:36:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T10:36:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=7758"},"modified":"2026-07-16T15:36:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T10:36:40","slug":"blatant-medicaid-fraud-in-queens-that-ag-letitia-james-cant-bother-to-notice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=7758","title":{"rendered":"Blatant Medicaid fraud in Queens that AG Letitia James can&#8217;t bother to notice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F2%2F2026%2F07%2FTJ2323.jpg?quality%3D90%26strip%3Dall\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>For fresh proof of how little New York authorities care about social-services fraud, consider the curious case of adult daycares in Flushing.<\/p>\n<p>Dr. Mehmet Oz, who<a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/03\/us-news\/dr-oz-launches-fraud-probe-of-nys-124b-medicaid-program\/\"> oversees the Centers for Medicare &amp; Medicaid Services<\/a>, puts out that within a one-mile radius in the Queens neighborhood, a full 64 Social Adult Day Care centers operate, with thousands upon thousands of supposed elderly enrollees.<\/p>\n<p>This reeks: Over the past three years, such New York senior centers have generated $2.5 billion in billings, with $2.1 billion of that coming from Flushing.<\/p>\n<p>Flushing\u2019s Medicaid-eligible senior population grew by 20% from 2018 to 2024, yet the number of seniors billed by social adult daycares surged by 390%.<\/p>\n<p>How convenient that electronic sign-up sheets are usually the only thing SADCs need to provide to get reimbursed.<\/p>\n<p>To be clear, some centers have real enrollees, but then again they bribe seniors with <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/02\/10\/us-news\/queens-adult-day-care-scammers-threatened-seniors-over-120m-kickback-scheme-feds\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">monthly $500 kickbacks<\/a> \u2014 but that payout drops to $300 if they actually <em>show up<\/em> for services.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"single__inline-module aligncenter wp-block-nypost-editor-primary-tag\">\n<div class=\"inline-module inline-module--more inline-module--author inline-module--more--thirds\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__inner\">\n<h2 class=\"inline-module__heading subsection-heading subsection-heading--underline subsection-heading--underline--indent-30 \">\n\t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"subsection-heading__sub\">Post Editorial Board<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/h2>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Nor do the scams stop there: Centers team up with pharmacies and durable medical equipment stores (one Flushing entrepreneur was running three such \u201cstores\u201d out of his apartment), steering enrollees toward unneeded medications or wheelchairs to generate more taxpayer reimbursements.<\/p>\n<div class=\"single__inline-module inline-module inline-module--newsletter aligncenter inline-module--nypostbusinessunit aligncenter wp-block-nypost-editor-newsletter\" data-source-unit=\"Inline Newsletter Module Post Opinion\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__inner\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__title-wrapper\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__unsubmitted-title-wrapper\">\n<h3 class=\"inline-module__title headline headline--combo-sm-md\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGet opinions and commentary from our columnists\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h3>\n<p class=\"inline-module__cta\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSubscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter!\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><h3 class=\"inline-module__title headline headline--combo-sm-md\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tThanks for signing up!\t\t\t\t\t<\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>And it would all continue on, absent <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/05\/14\/opinion\/trumps-medicaid-fraud-crackdown-may-hurt-some-people-but-not-those-who-need-it\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Team Trump\u2019s war on fraud<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Plainly, state Attorney General Tish James and other top officials just don\u2019t care; they see it as free money (no matter how much goes to fraudsters), as government-funded personal assistance has become the state\u2019s fastest-growing industry \u2014 jumping from $2.5 billion in 2019 to $12 billion in 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/07\/09\/us-news\/ny-attorney-general-letitia-james-ranked-among-worst-in-us-for-prosecuting-medicaid-fraud-analysis\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Under James\u2019 \u201cleadership,\u201d<\/a> New York ranks 49th among the states for criminal investigations per billion of Medicaid dollars spent.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>No doubt, she\u2019ll win the fraudster vote this November.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For fresh proof of how little New York authorities care about social-services fraud, consider the curious case of adult daycares in Flushing. Dr. Mehmet Oz, who oversees the Centers for Medicare &amp; Medicaid Services, puts out that within a one-mile radius in the Queens neighborhood, a full 64 Social Adult Day Care centers operate, with&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/07\/TJ2323.jpg?quality=75&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-hub"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}