Baltimore (WJZ) — The Unemployed Labor Union (UWU) withdrew its fight in circuit court for a renewed push for Marylanders to receive claims for unpaid benefits.
“People need this money to feed their families, people need this money to pay bills, people need this money,” said UWU attorney Alec Summerfield.
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On Monday, the group filed another lawsuit against the Maryland Department of Labor. The union wants the circuit court to review the agency’s handling of unpaid benefits.
“Our petition argues that we need to take court steps as they are allowed under the law and review administrative actions in violation of the law,” Summerfield alleges.
Since the start of the pandemic, the Maryland Labor Department said it paid out nearly $14.5 billion in unemployment benefits.
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At this time, over 99 percent of non-fraudulent and properly completed claims have been processed.
The backlog of claims is also nearly complete, while the last batch of “highly complex cases” still require a thorough review, the agency explained.
The Maryland Labor Department said in a statement that unemployment fraud has been a significant challenge since the start of the pandemic.
“To date, our fraud prevention team has identified approximately 1.8 million claimants and 2.3 million total claims as potentially fraudulent,” the statement said. “We have received more fraudulent claims than honest and qualified claims, and just last week legislation was introduced in the Maryland legislature to double the penalty for unemployment insurance fraud, which hasn’t been updated in more than 35 years. Is.”
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UWU first filed suit against the Maryland Department of Labor in July. A circuit judge later rejected his motion.