President Biden’s pick for a position overseeing unemployment claims has been blamed for her state’s loss of more than $600 million to Nigerian fraudsters.
Suzi LeVine, who ran Washington state’s Employment Security Department, has been tapped by the Biden administration to serve as the interim assistant secretary of the Employment & Training Administration, which helps states in processing unemployment claims.
However, LeVine has been criticized after her department was scammed out of more than $600 million by a Nigeria fraud ring that used stolen identities to file more than 122,000 fraudulent unemployment claims. An investigation by the state blamed LeVine for not correcting a software vulnerability that was exploited by the fraudsters.
Although the state of Washington has been able to recover around $357 million, it is still missing $243 million.
In her position in the Biden administration, LeVine would be a key player in boosting the labor market following pandemic shutdowns.
