Is Massachusetts about to get the full “war on fraud” treatment from the Trump administration? You have to wonder after President Trump’s SOTU assertion that welfare fraud in Massachusetts, Maine and California is “even worse” than what’s been found in Minnesota. … Gov. Healey is pushing back against the claim, as the Herald reports. …  Vice President Vance sure looks like he’s raring to go as Trump’s new fraud-buster in chief, withholding Medicaid funds from Minnesota until, well, who knows.  … I can see it now: withholding federal bucks from Massachusetts, similar to what the administration has done to Harvard. Think of all the ga-ga MAGA praise Vance would get!

GBH’s Adam Reilly looks at the president’s “even worse” claims and finds they don’t exactly pass muster, though he does raise the prospect of potentially huge amounts of welfare “leakage” in Massachusetts. He explains… I could be wrong but I don’t think the administration is going to differentiate much between fraud and ‘leakage.’

The Herald has been all over the fraud-is-everywhere story/hysteria, even running a long piece Sunday about an anonymous whistleblower’s claims of ‘rampant’ fraud within the state’s SNAP program. I have my qualms about the one-source piece, mainly that’s it’s a one-source piece. But this is the state that just spent billions on the right-to-shelter fiasco, etc. Do you really think the Trump administration will differentiate between fraud and really bad policy? 

Update –A reader notes that John L. Micek at MassLive was already looking at how the “fraud furor” might impact the Massachusetts governor’s race — even before President Trump poured more fuel on it on Tuesday.