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n the second major announcement from the White House anti-fraud task force, Vice President JD Vance revealed that the administration has forcibly closed roughly 800 hospice and home health care centers in California and is deferring $1.3 billion in Medicaid reimbursements to the state.

Additionally, the task force is sending a letter to all 50 statewide Medicaid and Medicare systems warning them to boost anti-fraud efforts or risk losing federal funding. The vice president said the deferrals are due in part to providers prescribing unnecessary medications to benefit from federal programs.?

“We want to ensure that the American taxpayer isn’t getting fleeced,” Vance said from the Eisenhower Executive Office Building while patting himself and his team on the back. “And I’d say just a few months into it, gentlemen, we have done a very, very good job.”

Wednesday’s announcement marks the second major push the task force has made in the past year. In February, Vance announced the government would withhold Medicaid reimbursements from Minnesota until it proved it would tackle alleged fraud in daycare centers. In March, the task force sent letters to some 400 businesses receiving government money asking for proof of legitimacy. Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz said at the event that the California deferral is the largest the federal government has ever made. He also said the government is cracking down on fraudulent hospice centers.?

Even though the White House has shut down roughly 800 centers, Oz noted, only a handful have reached out to object to the closures.?

“We have less than 20 who have complained, and we’re not even sure those are legitimate,” Oz said during the news conference. “It’s like crickets out there. So we believe we’re on the right path here.”

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