Feds, Bonta clash over credit for cases alleging billions of dollars in healthcare fraud – Los Angeles Times

Feds, Bonta clash over credit for cases alleging billions of dollars in healthcare fraud  Los Angeles Times

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli traded barbs at dueling healthcare fraud news conferences in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday morning, sniping at each other over billions lost to benefits schemes and the increasingly politicized efforts to stop them. "California has a fraud problem," Essayli said at the 9:30 a.m. news conference, where he and a phalanx of federal investigators announced a sweeping take-down of doctors and others they say lured vulnerable patients into needless surgical procedures, sham treatment programs and bogus hospice care, bilking taxpayers for nearly $2 billion. "Whether it's hospice fraud, or healthcare fraud or election fraud, California does fraud best," the prosecutor added, seeming to connect the cases with his office's simultaneous attempt to sequester midterm ballots it says were issued to noncitizens.

Bonta struck back at his own news conference across the street an hour later, saying Essayli had deliberately elided his team's contribution to the raid — including the arrest of a surgeon accused of performing unnecessary and invasive procedures for profit — part of what he termed a pattern of "improper politicization and weaponization” of medical fraud investigations. “This isn’t a political game for us," Bonta said. "This is about protecting taxpayer dollars, protecting the programs that sick and vulnerable Californians rely on, and protecting our state."