Elon Musk Issues Warning Over Unemployment Claims

Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have said tens of thousands of people have incorrectly claimed unemployment benefits from the federal government.

Newsweek has contacted DOGE for comment via email outside regular working hours.

Why It Matters

Upon returning to office on January 20, President Donald Trump created DOGE by executive order to slim down government spending and restructure the federal workforce. Proponents of the task force, which Musk heads, argue that it is rooting out fraud and waste in the federal budget. However, critics say DOGE has cut essential programs and staff.

What To Know

On Wednesday, DOGE posted figures on X, formerly Twitter, that it said were for incorrect unemployment insurance payments.

Unemployment insurance pays benefits to eligible applicants who lose their job through no fault of their own. It is administered by state governments and is funded by state and federal payroll taxes levied on employers and workers. Most states offer 26 weeks' worth of unemployment benefits.

According to DOGE, since 2020, 24,500 individuals over the age of 115 have claimed a total of $59 million in benefits; 28,000 claimants between the ages of 1 and 5 received $254 million; and 9,700 people with birth dates more than 15 years in the future were paid $69 million in benefits.

In one case, a claimant recorded as being born in the year 2154 received $41,000, DOGE said.

The task force did not include the source of the data in its X post. It also remains unclear whether these cases involve data input errors.

Musk commented on the post: "Your tax dollars were going to pay fraudulent unemployment claims for fake people born in the future! This is so crazy that I had to read it several times before it sank in."

According to the Department of Labor, unemployment insurance fraud can occur when a claimant knowingly submits false information, continues to collect benefits while knowing they are ineligible, or intentionally not reporting wages or income while collecting full benefits.

What People Are Saying

X user Kristjan Backman wrote: "Congratulations you have uncovered a problem entering data. If you look at the data, and you look at studies of data entry errors you will see that the amount of bad data is actually less than you would expect for the volume of entries. Some fraud for sure but what you are seeing is just a general garbage in garbage out problem."

User Tom Hennessy wrote: "If this is illegal why aren't we seeing people prosecuted at scale?"

User Stephen Richardson wrote: "This is so obtuse that one has to think that maybe citizens never applied for these benefits, perhaps government officials and NGO's did. Because there's just no way that someone would be able to get this by without it being flagged. This sounds like a Major Government Money Laundering Scam."

User Molly Cash wrote: "Let's see the records on the 2154 date Elon. Show us it wasn't an entry error."

What Happens Next

Musk is set to exit his role in the Trump administration but the date of his departure has not been announced.