Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the bipartisan Elder Abuse Protection Act. I proudly sponsored this legislation because, quite frankly, back in the day, when I was a geriatric social worker, I saw firsthand the abuse targeted against our seniors as consumers. This bill will help ensure that our seniors today, the group that most disproportionately was impacted by COVID-19, are not continuing as targets of fraudulent crimes. I thank Representative Spartz for joining me in this legislation. This March, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Internet Crime Complaint Center released its 2020 internet crime report, noting it received 105,301 complaints--over 100,000 complaints--from victims over the age of 60. That was a whopping 54 percent increase from the 2019 numbers of 68,000 complaints. If you look at the cost and value of these complaints, it was $966 million, an approximate 15 percent increase from the 2019 number of $835 million. What is worse, Mr. Speaker, is that these statistics reflect only those complaints in which the victim voluntarily provided their age range as over 60. So there may be even more. Victims over the age of 60 are targeted by perpetrators because they are believed to have significant reliable financial resources. The evidence is clear, as the United States ages, diversifies, and modernizes, the number of older adults experiencing elder abuse is, unfortunately, also projected to increase.…”