"Defund the Data": The Secret Amendment That Could Blind Fraud Investigators Forever

The Drill Down with Peter Schweizer

Government Accountability Institute

News Commentary, News, Daily News, Politics

4.9 • 627 Ratings

🗓️ 2 June 2026

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

They caught $200 billion in fraud — now Congress wants to take away the tools that found it. Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers are joined by fraud investigator Andy McClanahan to expose a buried amendment that would ban federal agencies from buying the data they use to hunt criminal fraud networks. Critics call it the "digital defunding of the police." Plus: a $14B Russian Medicare bust, the IRS keeping your biometrics while fraud cops get cut off, and Washington State chaos — a ballot box that exploded, 360 blank ballots in a dumpster, and voter cards where 92% of names were Chinese. Take away the data, and investigators go back to a notepad and pencil. Here's who benefits. Subscribe at TheDrillDown.com

Transcript

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0:00.0	Research that resonates.
0:05.0	He's the president of the Government Accountability Institute, Peter Switzer.
0:09.0	Peter Schweitzer. Peter Schweitzer. Peter Schweitzer has spent many years, in fact, probably
0:16.0	done a more comprehensive job than anyone's ever done, chronicling the corruption by the powerful in Washington.
0:26.1	Be very prescient Eric Eggers. Join me right now is Government Accountability Institute Research Director, Eric Eggers. We're going to take information that we've learned, that people like
0:30.6	Peter Schweitzer have uncovered, and we're going to try to go further. Great investigative reporting,
0:36.1	Peter. You're the only one doing it?
0:37.6	Thank God.
0:38.6	Eric Eggers from the Government Accountability Institute and co-hosts of that great podcast,
0:43.4	The Drilled Down with Peter Schweitzer.
0:45.7	This is The Drill Down with Peter Schweitzer.
0:49.7	Hi, it's Peter Schweitzer, and welcome to The Drill Down.
0:52.2	How do you prevent fraud from being exposed?
0:55.7	Well, the first thing you do is deny that it exists. The second thing you do is you prevent fraud
1:01.5	investigators from having the tools they need to actually uncover it. And that's precisely what's
1:07.5	happening right now with our federal government and also at the state and local level.
1:11.9	We're going to unpack that today with a very special guest.
1:15.0	Eric, how are you?
1:16.1	I'm excellent.
1:16.7	I'm really excited for this episode because I think we're going to break some news and I think we're going to tell people about some things that are happening that they would really struggle to believe.
1:25.6	Like, it's one thing to think, okay, maybe not everyone's that motivated to go out
1:30.0	and tackle fraud, which remember, when you say fraud, another word for fraud is crime.
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