CA Gov. Gavin Newsom flanked by Sacramento Democrats (Photo: @CAGovernor)
Gavin Newsom Blows $20 Million on Insider Consultants to ‘Cut Waste’
California’s exposure to fraud, waste, and improper payments totals roughly $435 billion over recent years; Boston Consulting Group might deliver $810 million in savings
By Megan Barth, April 3, 2026 12:09 pm
In yet another masterclass in Sacramento-style “reform,” Governor Gavin Newsom has handed up to $20 million to the Boston Consulting Group — the same elite firm that now employs his former Cabinet Secretary and Department of Finance Director Ana J. Matosantos — to play detective on government bloat.
This is the same Gavin Newsom who loves to brag that California was “cutting waste and improving efficiency long before Elon Musk.” If that were the case, the number of government agencies flagged as “high risk” by the state auditor wouldn’t have doubled under his tenure.
The target? Not the entire sprawling state bureaucracy. Not the fraud epidemic documented across California’s major programs. Not the eight state agencies flagged as “high risk.” Just three giant agencies: the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Social Services, and Health Care Services.
The bold promise? Deliver $2 billion in savings by fiscal year 2028-29.
The embarrassing reality? Just $810 million projected now — less than half the target — with legislative analysts already signaling it could shrink even more.
Republican Assemblyman Tom Lackey captured the growing frustration perfectly: “This whole Boston Consulting Group contract has me mystified… We were told that’s what we were going to get, but we haven’t even come close to that.”
Even Democratic Assemblyman Nick Schultz admitted the bad optics: “At a time when we might be asked to cut part of the social safety net back, I think everyone’s rightfully looking at saying, ‘What are we getting for $20 million?’”
What are we getting, Nick? Rearranged deck chairs on the $435 billion Titanic.
California’s exposure to fraud, waste, and improper payments totals roughly $435 billion over recent years. That’s nearly identical to the entire GDP of Colombia (approximately $438 billion in 2025), larger than the entire GDP of 130 countries, and equivalent to about 1.42% of the entire U.S. economy — enough money to run an entire mid-sized country for a year, yet Sacramento treats it like spare change.
The fraud in California is larger than the *entire GDP* of about 130 countries https://t.co/kvUczQKP4V pic.twitter.com/fO0CoLqDvr
— Arthur MacWaters (@ArthurMacwaters) April 2, 2026
Here’s how the staggering total breaks down across major programs (according to our extensive reporting):
- Medi-Cal: $95–$146 billion (because when you hand out hundreds of billions in healthcare dollars with minimal or zero verification, overbilling, ineligible recipients, and kickback schemes tend to flourish).
- Unemployment Insurance (EDD): $31–$55 billion (including $20–$32.6 billion in confirmed fraudulent claims during the pandemic funneled to prison inmates, out-of-state scammers, and imaginary claimants — all while real Californians waited months for a check).
- Homelessness & Housing Programs: $25–$37 billion (billions flushed into the homelessness industrial complex with little to show except more tents, more excuses, and persistent questions about where the money actually went).
- CalFresh (Food Stamps): $20–$25 billion (high error rates that risk billions in federal matching funds because eligibility checks are apparently optional in Sacramento).
- Capital Projects & Infrastructure: $30–$50 billion (cost overruns, mismanagement, and good old-fashioned waste in megaprojects — because why build efficiently when you can just keep spending?).
- Other health care, welfare, and miscellaneous programs: The rest of the rotting pile that brings the grand total to a jaw-dropping $312–$435 billion.
As the California Globe has chronicled for years, this staggering figure has turned the Golden State into the undisputed Fraud Capital of America, or in U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli’s words, California is the “Kingdom of Fraud.”
Instead of aggressive internal reforms or full-scale accountability, Newsom’s answer is another pricey consultant report limited to just three departments — all while the state grapples with a $2.9 billion projected deficit for 2026-27 (per the Governor’s own proposal) and looming multiyear structural shortfalls estimated as high as $20–$35 billion annually in the years ahead.
While federal prosecutors under Bill Essayli aggressively pursue fraud rings in hospice, homelessness funds, and beyond, Sacramento’s alleged fiscal watchdogs are out to lunch.
California’s State Controller Malia Cohen (D) “has the sole power to audit state agencies and local governments receiving state funds, investigate waste and fraud, and ensure proper disbursement before a single warrant is issued. No other office is uniquely endowed with this combination of independence, auditing authority, and day-to-day fiscal oversight.”
Yet, in 2021, Cohen’s business, Power Forward, had its license suspended by the Franchise Tax Board for failure to file returns and pay taxes. More than a decade ago, her San Francisco condo went into foreclosure,” as revealed by Herb Morgan, who is running to replace her.
Sometimes the jokes just write themselves… and write $20 million checks to insiders.
- California’s Bloated Bureaucracy: 518 Agencies, 25% More Employees & 48% Spending Surge as Population Growth Remains Flat - April 4, 2026
- Gavin Newsom Blows $20 Million on Insider Consultants to ‘Cut Waste’ - April 3, 2026
- UC Berkeley Study: Sacramento’s Regulations Create America’s Highest Poverty Rate, Triggering California Exodus - April 2, 2026
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January 26, 2021
LOOK AT ALL THE WOMEN Gov Hair Gel surrounds himself with. Only three guys of 25 total onlookers. Chicks dig hair, teeth, and nice suits, I guess…sparkly things to birds, squirrels and liberal women. THAT’S how he intends to make a play for 2028. Go for the V, the rest will follow.
Gavin Newsom : a bunch of women, Ricardo Lara 🌈 and Rob Bonta 🤡
It’s a coven of demonic Democrat witches and their evil warlock Gavin Newsom. Maybe they’re all smiling like Cheshire cats because of the kickbacks and payoffs they’re getting from the $20 million dollar consulting contract?
^^^ Brutally true….
And to elaborate…
a COMPETENT Governor with technical training and background + REAL-WORLD experience would be able to PREVENT these issues up front and not REQUIRE a white-shoe consulting firm to come in at top-dollar to explain why and how the state got so EFFED UP!!!
Gavin Newsom is an ABJECT FAILURE and he and his “First Partner” IN CRIME should be in prison jumpsuits at BEST, and ridden out of town in disgrace AT LEAST….
What an embarrassment Newsom is….
Yuck, why are Senator Pro Tem Monique Limon and First Partner Jennifer Seibel grinning their faces off. In the face of Gavin Newsom rotting out the entire state.
Was this Newsom fan-girls love fest? Gaia, Kali, the and the grinning goddesses of destruction strike again. You are known by the company you keep, Gavin. Surrounding yourself with hacks and wannabes is not a good look.
Oh, great, another diversionary sleight of hand meant to befuddle the under-informed that conveniently results in ANOTHER multi-million dollar slush fund by that King of the Phonies and Worst Governor Ever Gavin Newsom.
I can’t stand to look at the guy anymore. Every single thing about this venomous snake and his jaw-droppingly artificial and clueless wifey and his gimme-gimme circle of “supporters” deeply disgusts me — and I’m not alone, of course! Call me when he is arrested, indicted, perp-walked, prosecuted, and convicted for his many sleazy sneaky slimy slithery crimes against the People of the State of California.
None of the usual Newsom tricks are going to work now. Look over there! Trump! Etc.
People sense weakness. The Feds are going to make an example of California. FAFO Gavin.
Malia Cohen, California State Controller, is a elected DEI Democrat. She has nothing to recommend her to that position other than her gender and race. She can’t even run her own affairs, let alone the state’s. Her home was foreclosed in 2010. She claims she was a “victim” after taking two no money down adjustable rate loans. Can you be any more stupid than that? She is as dumb as a box of rocks. During the 2022 California controller’s race, Malia Cohen faced scrutiny over a 2021 suspension of her business license for “failure to file” and “failure to pay” taxes.
Yet here we are folks. The absolute dumbest voters in the world elected her. But here is what’s really important to Democrats, “Malia M. Cohen is the first Black woman to serve as California’s State Controller, making history upon her swearing-in on January 2, 2023.” Who cares if the state is robbed by fraudsters? What matters is she is the first black woman Controller.
Was Malia M. Cohen legitimately elected by registered voters, or more likely, was she selected and put into office with Democrat voter fraud and rigged voting machines? Don’t expect Shirley Weber, California’s first Black Secretary of State and the state’s chief elections officer, to investigate voter fraud because she was likely installed into office with Democrat voter fraud and rigged voting machines as well.
I am so willing to bet Controller Malia M Cohen was not legitimately elected.
And re SOS Shirley Weber, the story is even worse than you guessed. Bonus points: a refresher on how Padilla slipped in as a U.S. Senator. In the throes of “covid,” no less, how convenient! Disgusting.
Excerpt from Shirley Weber’s Wikipedia:
“In December 2020, Governor Gavin Newsom appointed Weber as California’s secretary of state, succeeding Alex Padilla, whom he had appointed as California’s junior United States senator. Weber is the first African American to serve as California’s secretary of state and the fifth to serve in a statewide position.”
What is his cut of the 20 million?
It’s coming. Open Secrets says Boston Consulting Group gave six times as much money to Democrats vs. Republicans in 2024.
Newscum doesn’t do anything unless it benefits him personally.