Trump 'War on Fraud' Agenda

NPR reports that the Trump administration has proposed repealing a 2024 Biden-era regulation that requires states to pay child care subsidies from the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) in advance and based on enrollment, rather than after the fact based on daily attendance. The rule, finalized by HHS under President Biden, was designed to stabilize child care providers serving low-income families—like an Illinois center where 90% of children are on subsidies—by giving them predictable monthly revenue similar to how private-pay parents are billed. In a video released after YouTube-driven fraud allegations about Minnesota’s subsidy system, then–HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill argued that up‑front, enrollment-based payments "weakened accountability and made fraud easier, not harder," and the department used those claims to justify its plan to scrap the rule altogether. The rollback would let states continue tying subsidy payments to fluctuating attendance, maintaining financial volatility in poorer communities even as some states had already begun shifting to enrollment-based payments or sought waivers to comply. The proposal fits into the administration’s broader 'war on fraud' rhetoric, but so far HHS has not publicly produced data showing that the Biden payment structure itself increased CCDF fraud, a gap that is drawing skepticism from child-care advocates and policy analysts.