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Sunday, May 10, 2026
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n Atlanta Rapper Allegedly Stole $4.4 Million in Food Stamps and Bragged About a Private Jet. Vance's Task Force Caught Him.

Mercedes New calls himself Shawty Dred online. He's an Atlanta rapper with more than 2 million Instagram followers, and he likes to show off his extensive jewelry collection, stacks of cash, private jet rides and other trappings of wealth.

On Wednesday, at the FBI's field office in Cincinnati, Vice President JD Vance played one of his videos. In it, New brags about a private jet.

Federal prosecutors say the money behind that lifestyle came from food meant for hungry children. They've charged New with dozens of counts, including SNAP fraud, mail fraud, and aggravated identity theft, in a scheme they say stole about $4.4 million from the food stamp program.

According to prosecutors, New controlled more than 350 fraudulent EBT accounts opened with stolen identities and had the cards mailed to addresses around the country. Then he registered his own company, Shawty Dred LLC, as an authorized SNAP retailer, which let him run the fraudulent transactions through his own business. Vance said New called the system nearly 9,000 times to keep it going.

Federal agents arrested him in Las Vegas last week.

"A guy who is quite literally taking food from the mouths of children so that he can enrich himself," Vance said. "That cannot go on."

New is the flashiest defendant in a nationwide crackdown, but he's not the biggest. Vance and Attorney General Todd Blanche announced charges against more than 40 defendants across 13 federal districts, covering $42 million in SNAP fraud uncovered in just seven weeks. The surge began on September 1.

"Two-hundred twenty thousand Americans could've eaten for the entire month of October if it were not for this $42 million in fraud," AG Blanche said.

The largest case is in Chicago. Prosecutors say store operators Jorag Yaseen and Rami Kanaan used stolen EBT information from Ohio and other states to fake thousands of food purchases, taking about $29.7 million from the program. Some of the money allegedly bought vehicles that were shipped overseas. Both were arrested Wednesday and charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering.

In Massachusetts, prosecutors say a Dominican national named Fernandez Guzman stole an American citizen's identity to collect more than $22,000 in food stamps, plus tens of thousands of dollars in Medicaid and Section 8 housing assistance. Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald said Guzman "is suspected to be unlawfully in the United States."

So an illegal immigrant allegedly stole an American's identity to collect three different welfare programs.

The $42 million is only the latest result. The administration's fraud task force says it has now identified $641 million in SNAP fraud. More than 1,000 retailers have been banned from the program for trafficking and other violations, and thousands more have been suspended or fined.

For years, Washington treated food stamp fraud as a cost of doing business. The money went out, the fraudsters took their share, and the families the program was built for got what was left. Every dollar New allegedly ran through his fake accounts was a dollar meant for a child's dinner, and every one of those dollars came from taxpayers.

Vance knows what the program is supposed to do. He said members of his own family relied on food assistance. That's why he says the people stealing from it are stealing from families like his.

"There are people who will steal from the mouths of hungry children in order to enrich themselves," Vance said.

The crackdown isn't slowing down. The administration has also launched a whistleblower program that pays Americans up to 1% of the fraud their tips help recover.

"That effort," Blanche said, "will continue for as long as it takes."

Prosecutors say New ran 350 fake accounts, made nearly 9,000 calls, and took $4.4 million meant to feed hungry kids. He now faces dozens of federal counts, and the task force that caught him has identified $641 million in fraud so far.

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