The Biden administration improperly funneled more than $90 million in forgiven Paycheck Protection Program loans to Planned Parenthood affiliates, despite the organization being deemed ineligible for the funds, Sen. Joni Ernst said on Wednesday.
The Iowa Republican told “Wake Up America” that she uncovered the payments as part of her broader push to investigate alleged fraud tied to COVID-19 relief programs and recover taxpayer money.
“This is not an uplifting story,” Ernst said. “I uncovered that the Biden administration had given Planned Parenthood affiliates through the Paycheck Protection Program over $90 million, forgave those loans, even though they were ineligible.”
Ernst also said officials attempted to conceal the payments by using misleading terminology in records.
“Even worse than that, they tried to obscure the fact that they had done this illegally by using the code word Benghazi,” she said. “What does Benghazi have to do with Planned Parenthood? Absolutely nothing.”
Ernst said she is backing the Small Business Administration Fraud Enforcement Extension Act, which would give federal investigators more time to pursue pandemic-related fraud cases.
“The time to go after those fraudsters is running out,” she said. “We want to allow additional time for the Department of Justice to do their investigations, to go after the fraudsters, and reclaim the American taxpayer money that went out the door fraudulently.”
Ernst said the measure has full Republican support and some backing from Democrats, though she called for broader bipartisan cooperation.
“We’d love to have a little more Democratic support in this area,” she said.
Ernst also briefly commented on King Charles III’s Tuesday address to Congress, describing it as unexpectedly engaging.
“I thought it would be a normal, stuffy, dry British address, and yet King Charles came in and charmed the entire Congress,” she said, adding that the speech was “uplifting” and highlighted the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom.
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