Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says the Trump administration blocked $175 million in federal payments that were headed to deceased individuals — killing the payments before a single dollar went out the door.
According to the administration, 13,500 separate payments were stopped, while a staggering $3.7 trillion in federal payments were verified in a single year to help identify potential fraud. The goal, Bessent says, is to move beyond Washington's old "pay and chase" model — where the government sends the money first and tries to claw it back later — and make prevention the first line of defense.
The centerpiece of the effort is the federal "Do Not Pay" system, a Treasury-run database designed to flag improper payments before they're issued. The administration says access to the system has exploded under Trump — from just 4% of federal programs under Biden to 99% today. That means nearly every federal program now checks payments against death records, debarment lists, and other fraud indicators before releasing funds.
Bessent, a veteran investor who took the helm at Treasury with a mandate to clean up federal finances, has made improper payments one of his signature targets. For years, watchdogs have warned that the federal government hemorrhages billions annually to payments sent to dead people, duplicate recipients, and ineligible claimants — money that is rarely recovered once it's gone.
"Stop the fraud before the money ever leaves," Bessent says — and the numbers suggest the strategy is working. Blocking $175 million before it goes out is $175 million taxpayers never have to chase down.
Critics of the administration will inevitably question the figures or the methods, but the direction is hard to argue with: verify first, pay second. After decades of "pay and chase," prevention-first is the kind of basic competence taxpayers have been waiting for.