WASHINGTON (TNND) — The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and Department of Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer confirmed new findings which its says shows over $382 million dollars in fraudulent unemployment expenses by the federal government.
In a post via X, DOGE cited “an initial survey” of unemployment claims since 2020. That probe, it said, found multiple instances of abuse of unemployment funds.
“24.5k people over 115 years old claimed $59M in benefits,” DOGE wrote. “28k people between 1 and 5 years old claimed $254M in benefits. 9.7k people with birth dates over 15 years in the future claimed $69M in benefits.”
“In one case, someone with a birthday in 2154 claimed $41k,” it added.
An initial survey of Unemployment Insurance claims since 2020 revealed the following:
— Department of Government Efficiency (@DOGE) April 10, 2025
– 24.5k people over 115 years old claimed $59M in benefits
– 28k people between 1 and 5 years old claimed $254M in benefits
– 9.7k people with birth dates over 15 years in the future claimed…
DOGE head Elon Musk reacted strongly to the latest findings.
“Your tax dollars were funding fraudulent unemployment claims made by fake people—some supposedly born in the future!” he said. “It was so outrageous, I had to read it multiple times before I could believe it.”
He continued, “The oldest living American is 114, so if someone 115 or older is collecting unemployment, it’s safe to assume they’re doing it from beyond the grave. There was zero sanity check for people who were impossibly old or impossibly young.”
These revelations come as part of DOGE’s ongoing audit of federal government spending. Back in March, the group also claimed to have purged 7 million Social Security Administration accounts linked to individuals listed as over 120 years old.
SSA’s inspector general in 2015 reported its database automatically assigns incomplete data to a reference point over 150 years ago. This, it said, may have led to the number of seemingly fraudulent accounts.
The agency automatically halts benefits to accounts older than 115 but decided against a roughly $9 million database update to correct this.