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Republican New York attorney general candidate Saritha Komatireddy is making Medicaid fraud enforcement a centerpiece of her campaign, accusing incumbent Attorney General Letitia James of allowing annual fraud recoveries to fall from $168 million in 2019 to just $31 million in 2024.
Komatireddy, a former federal prosecutor, says the decline has cost New York taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars and demands a sharper prosecutorial posture from the state's top law enforcement office.
A Record of Declining Recoveries Komatireddy draws a direct line between James's tenure and a sustained drop in Medicaid fraud enforcement, citing figures from the New York Attorney General's own annual reports.
Under Democratic predecessors, the numbers tell a different story: Eliot Spitzer's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit recovered $243.6 million in 2006, and Andrew Cuomo's office posted more than $660 million in its first three years, including $283 million in 2009 alone.
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