LA County homeless spending under the microscope of newly appointed US attorney

The freshly appointed, MAGA-aligned U.S. lawyer for the Central District of California, which includes Los Angeles County, has launched an ambitious caller national transgression task unit aimed astatine forensically investigating however billions successful stateless backing implicit the past 5 years was spent.  

"We volition get to the bottommost of it. And if we find that immoderate national laws are violated, we volition apprehension and prosecute those individuals involved," U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli told Fox News successful his archetypal tv interrogation astatine his bureau successful Downtown Los Angeles.

Essayli announced the motorboat of the Homelessness Fraud and Corruption Task Force, which volition see national prosecutors from the FBI, IRS and HUD. One of the items connected the docket is investigating the results of a caller audit that revealed $2.3 cardinal of stateless backing is unaccounted for successful Los Angeles County alone.

"That is not a rounding error. That's a batch of money. So we privation to get to the bottommost of wherever that wealth went," Essayli said.

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U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli spoke with Fox News successful his archetypal tv interrogation astatine his bureau successful Downtown Los Angeles. (Fox News)

Los Angeles County has received nationwide disapproval for being incapable to hole its stateless colonisation that is disposable from the streets of Skid Row successful downtown, to the VA Hospital connected Wilshire Boulevard and tourer blistery spots successful coastal Santa Monica.  

"It's un-American what's happening there. You person radical surviving connected the streets and there's thing around, there's nary authorities services that are being offered," Essayli said astir his caller circuit of Skid Row.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said she hoped Essayli’s probe would not go a "fishing expedition" oregon a "distraction" to her stateless mission.

"Last year, Los Angeles bucked nationalist increases with a 10% alteration successful thoroughfare homelessness and preliminary information points to different alteration for a 2nd twelvemonth successful a row," a Bass spokesperson wrote successful a statement. "These results are successful portion owed to accrued accountability and transparency astir results and budgeting."

There is an estimated 75,000 stateless radical successful Los Angeles County, according to a 2024 survey.

A stateless encampment is seen on a roadside successful Los Angeles connected Dec. 6, 2022. (FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images)

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The seat of the LA County Board of Supervisors, Kathryn Barger, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom told Fox News they welcomed Essayli’s investigation.

"I judge this task unit volition adhd a much-needed furniture of oversight that volition assistance reconstruct nationalist spot and guarantee resources really scope those successful need," Barger wrote successful a statement.

Newsom’s bureau said the politician has called for spending accountability, including mechanisms to "claw back" stateless backing from section governments that failed to show progress. 

"Local governments indispensable usage authorities and national homelessness dollars responsibly — and we expect them to present results. We stock the national administration’s extremity of ensuring payer funds are being utilized efficaciously to get radical disconnected our streets," a Newsom spokesperson wrote. 

Assemblymember Bill Essayli, left, who has pushed for parental notification policies from the legislature, speaks to a radical of protesters successful favour of the projected transgender notification argumentation earlier the commencement of an Orange Unified School District gathering wherever the committee volition determine if the OUSD volition instrumentality a transgender notification argumentation successful Orange connected Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023. (Leonard Ortiz/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)

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Essayli, a erstwhile intern successful the White House Counsel’s bureau during then-President George W. Bush’s administration, is simply a erstwhile national authoritative and, earlier being appointed U.S. attorney, was a Republican authorities assemblyman who often went head-to-head with Sacramento Democrats. The 39-year-old lawyer has been publically vocal astir his alignment with President Donald Trump's MAGA policies.

"This is precisely what President Trump wants done," Essayli said astir the task force. "He wants accountability for nationalist officials, helium wants accountability for taxpayers."