Lt. Gov. Patrick, Asked About a $9 Billion Fraud Scandal, Notes That 'the Governor Says the Buck Stops With Him'
The second-in-command of seven years agrees that 'more should have been done sooner,' presumably by whoever was in charge of doing it
Ink = the flip (fiction). Red = real Republican · Blue = real Democrat.
AUSTIN — Lt. Gov. Patrick, now the party's nominee for U.S. Senate, was asked this week about any personal responsibility for the sprawling benefits-fraud scandal that unfolded during seven years as the state's second-ranking official — a scandal federal investigators say may exceed $9 billion. 'I would say,' Patrick replied, 'the governor says the buck stops with him, more should have been done sooner, and I agree.'
The answer, which locates the buck one floor up and endorses its stopping there, has been received by the lieutenant governor's critics as a masterpiece of the form: a statement of accountability with no accountable party in it, delivered by the one person in state government whose entire job description is standing next to the governor.
Patrick went on to note that roughly 100 people have been charged and 60 convicted, figures the campaign presents as evidence of a system working and opponents present as evidence of the size of the thing that was allowed to happen while the system was in the building. The governor, for his part, has already declined to seek another term over the affair, leaving the buck with no one to stop at and the lieutenant governor pointing at an office that will soon be empty.
The Press's org-chart desk observes that the lieutenant governorship is the only office in America whose holder is close enough to power to be photographed with it and far enough away to be surprised by it, and that both parties field candidates who discover, exactly at the moment of promotion, that they were never really in the room.
Reaction followed the standing choreography. Voters aligned with the nominee heard candor: an official agreeing that the state fell short. Voters opposed heard a seven-year deputy throwing the boss down the marble stairs on the way to the Senate. The Press archives confirm both parties own the vocabulary — 'taking responsibility' and 'passing the buck' — and swap it, one floor up, whenever the other side is the one standing next to the governor.
The buck itself, seen rolling upstairs, had no comment; the door at the top is expected to be closed by January.
📜 The Receipts
What actually happened: Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan (D), the party's U.S. Senate nominee, was asked whether she bears responsibility for the state's fraud scandal (which federal investigators say could top $9 billion) and replied: 'the governor says the buck stops with him, more should have been done sooner, and I agree,' noting ~100 charged and 60 convicted; critics accused her of deflecting after seven years as Gov. Walz's No. 2.