Against the backdrop of the multi-billion dollar Medicaid fraud being pulled off in Minnesota and so far only partially uncovered (for all the dozens of indictments and convictions), a fraud that centers on sending those billions of dollars overseas, comes this move by Missouri’s State Treasurer Vivek Malek:

Missouri State Treasurer Vivek Malek told Just the News he is teaming up with the state legislature to impose new requirements that remittance payment businesses ensure that customers are lawfully in the United States before they can send money to foreign countries….

It’s not just Somali immigrants and illegal aliens resident in Minnesota, either.

“It has been found that at least $4.4 billion in remittances sent to Mexico have been tied to cartel money laundering through small wire transfers,” [Malek] said. “Cartels don’t sneak money across the border or throw the bag across the border. They wire it. And if we are serious about crushing cartels, we have to shut down their financial arteries.”

This is a strong move, and it’ll be instructive to see which States—Progressive-Democrat-run vs Republican-run—start taking similar steps. State by State legislation, though, is patchy, incomplete, and slow. What’s needed is the same move done at the Federal level. Treasury should monitor such transmissions, blocking those sent by inappropriate senders—illegal aliens, for instance. Treasury has ample authority under our Constitution’s Commerce Clause.

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations….

Remissions of US money to foreign relatives of those present in the US, whether legally so or illegal alien, is pretty clearly Commerce with foreign Nations.