Audit ‘collapsed’ unemployment claims system, Stephanie Murphy says

Democrats on the state level have bemoaned the busted unemployment claims system. Federal officials now hear them.

Friday evening, Orlando-area U.S. Rep. Stephanie Murphy bemoaned the “collapse” of the system in a letter to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Inspector General.

Murphy would like a holistic audit, both of recent failings and questionable use of $1.6 billion in federal funds over the last decade for the state’s program.

“As the COVID-19 pandemic has painfully revealed, Florida’s UC program is deficient in comparison to the UC programs in other states. This is the result of years of deliberate policy choices by Florida’s elected leaders designed to make it difficult for residents to access earned benefits, combined with indifference to the human consequences of those choices,” wrote Murphy.

“Despite the significant level of federal support that has been provided to Florida’s UC program over the years, the program has now collapsed at the precise time it is needed most, causing incalculable economic and emotional harm to Floridians whose lives have been upended by the COVID-19 crisis,” Murphy added.

Murphy spotlights Florida’s low benefits: 12 weeks, $275 max per week, which is one of the most miserly payouts in the country.

Gov. Ron DeSantis is taking concrete steps, such as website improvements and paper applications, to rectify woeful shortcomings in the state’s system, which have created a backlog of claims that a process designed to be slow-walked by the state was uniquely unready for.

However, his rhetoric on the crisis suggests a hands-off approach defined by disinterest until the recent “crush” of 500,000 new applicants to the system in the last three weeks.

However, the Governor won’t blame anyone for failures seven years in the making, including a year and four months under his stewardship.

“I was told by the agency [Department of Economic Opportunity] three weeks ago when I said ‘beef up the call center’, they said ‘just go to the website,” the Governor added. “They told me this website was great. Well, obviously, it couldn’t handle this capacity, they were wrong.”

DeSantis noted that even in normal times, applications take three weeks to process, suggesting that weeks of anxiety await displaced Florida families still.

Meanwhile, it will be up to the federal government to backstop for the state’s failure to prepare.

DeSantis wouldn’t address questions Friday from this reporter about expanding benefits from 12 to 26 weeks or beyond, preferring instead to let Washington shoulder the burden.

The Governor seemed to believe that the federal $600 supplement was enough to augment Tallahassee’s miserly stipend.

“$900 a week,” DeSantis said, “can make a big difference.”

The hope is that the U.S. economy surges back under stimulus money.

DeSantis, while a Freedom Caucus Republican in Congress, seems to have jettisoned some of those limited government principles now that he holds power.

The Governor indicated that he would back another round of stimulus spending, designed to support workers, in comments to Jacksonville media Friday.