In a nutshell:
- The audit found significant weaknesses in eligibility oversight for public assistance programs, including missing documentation, inaccurate income reporting, and insufficient verification procedures, risking improper benefit payments.
- Auditors found jailed individuals, dead people, and lottery winners who remained on food stamps or temporary cash assistance.
- Maryland SNAP payment error rate remains high costing millions of dollars in penalties.
- Vendor contract and management delays may have caused more theft of SNAP benefits
Full Story:
A newly released legislative audit highlights continued issues with how Maryland oversees hundreds-of-millions of dollars in tax-payer funded entitlements and social services programs.
In June we told you how Maryland was among America's top 10 states with the highest SNAP payment error rates (13.08%).
The audit follows-up on that, finding the State "did not take sufficient action to reduce Maryland’s SNAP error rate."
This reportedly cost Maryland $28 million in penalties, per the audit.
Under President Donald Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025, States are now responsible for increased SNAP contributions when error rates reach certain thresholds, which Maryland has repeatedly surpassed.
Despite their continued high error rate, Maryland's Department of Human Services took credit for what they called a significant reduction in errors.
As previously explained, Maryland is citing it's decrease in underpayments from 2024 (4.79%) to 2025 (2.19%), not its increase in overpayments during that same time span which overall caused the year-to-year average error rate to go down.
Much like an October 2022 audit we reported on, this newest one criticizes the State for paying high numbers of ineligible recipients, thousands of dollars in welfare benefits.
The audit notes nearly 2,000 jailed individuals still receiving food stamps or temporary cash assistance (TCA) months beyond their cut-off point.
"Under federal regulations individuals who are incarcerated for more than 30 days are ineligible to receive SNAP and TCA benefits while incarcerated," the audit states.
That standard apparently applied to lottery jackpot winners as well.
"A July 2023 match identified a recipient who won $2 million in the lottery but the [State] had not terminated the individual’s benefits as of February 2026," auditors discovered.
Then there were several occasions in which the State inaccurately documented the income some recipients were already getting prior to being granted government benefits.
"For example, 4 recipients with monthly wages ranging from $4,524 to $13,764, had no wages recorded in the [system]," the audit states. "According to State records as of November 2025, these 10 recipients have received benefits totaling $95,434 since becoming eligible."
In contrast, some who weren't making enough money beforehand were denied benefits.
The audit specifies how in one case, the State overstated an applicant's monthly wages by $1.3 million.
Auditors also noticed at least half-a-dozen recipients were essentially allowed to double-dip by receiving both unemployment pay and TCA, which is not permitted under law.
A lot of issues flagged within the TCA program came down to recipients not having proper documentation on file at the time of the audit.
For their part, the State says they've figured out the problem.
"The underlying issue in these cases was the identification and labeling of documents within the electronic case record rather than the absence of required documentation or improper eligibility," Human Services claims.
Besides SNAP and TCA, auditors focused on Medicaid payments which have been under recent scrutiny as well.
The audit captured nearly 550 Medicaid recipients who accrued more than $7 million in Medicaid bills despite no annual eligibility review as lawfully required.
SEE ALSO: Maryland reviewing millions in Medicaid payments to thousands of dead people
Finally, auditors tackled an issue WMAR-2 News has covered extensively in the past, that being Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) card security breaches, as thousands of Marylanders have reported millions in stolen benefits.
Specifically, these EBT cards weren't equipped with security chips to prevent hacking or fraudulent charges.
While the State's since issued new chip cards, auditors believe the whole process should've happened a lot sooner which could've helped avoid the massive amount of theft that took place.
According to the audit, the roll-out was delayed by a vendor contracting dispute.
The State reportedly awarded one company a $20 million contract to handle EBT services over another.
Afterwards it was revealed the company who ultimately received the contract omitted pricing information making it appear as though their price was best.
This prompted the losing company to file a complaint for which they later won, leading them to be awarded the contract.
As result the process of getting these chip cards in place was not only delayed, but nearly $11 million was paid-out to the original company in the interim.
Throughout the transition, stolen EBT benefits surpassed $12.5 million, all of which the State was forced to reimburse.
Human Services took exception to how auditors blamed and framed the procurement process for its financial woes.
"The Department has significant concerns regarding the assertion that our 2024 Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) contract procurement is evidence of a systemic failure of our procurement review process," DHS Secretary, Stacy L. Rodgers wrote in response. "Labeling a single procurement interpretation error as a failure to follow RFP terms significantly oversimplifies the procurement process."
Other than this disagreement, the Department appeared to agree to all of the audit's improvement recommendations going forward.
Below is the full audit.