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Patel Says the FBI Captured Four Most Wanted Fraudsters in Five Weeks, Totaling $2 Billion in Health Care Fraud

August 18, 2026 · FBI – Federal Bureau of Investigation · 0:01:13

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

In an August 16, 2026 media interview excerpted by the FBI, Director Kash Patel said the Bureau had captured four of the most wanted fraudsters in the world on three different continents in just the last five weeks, totaling $2 billion in Medicare and health care fraud money that, he said, was supposed to be allocated to the elderly and to children, as he stated the results. He credited the Anti-Fraud Task Force stood up by President Trump and the Vice President, as he described its role.

Patel also said the FBI had led the effort against scam centers in the cross-border regions of Southeast Asia — in Burma, Thailand and Cambodia — describing operations that take down the villages where, he said, criminal syndicates have built towns and trafficked laborers, freeing thousands of trafficked workers. He said that last year the FBI seized more than $15 billion connected to scam centers and is returning money to victims, as he stated the figure.

His message to the public was to report anything that sounds even slightly off — an email, text or phone call — to state and local law enforcement or to the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI, and he said that reporting is working, as he presented it.

Why it matters

The clip is the FBI’s fraud mission stated as a scoreboard: fugitive captures across three continents, a $2 billion fraud figure, and Southeast Asia scam-center takedowns, paired with a public reporting appeal.

Scoreboard watch

Scoreboard watch: Patel’s stated results — four most wanted fraudsters captured in five weeks involving $2 billion in Medicare and health care fraud, and more than $15 billion seized from scam centers last year, as he stated the figures on August 16, 2026 — flagged for the scoreboard editor to check against FBI case announcements; no verdict is entered here.

Sources: FBI – Federal Bureau of Investigation, “Patel: Four Most Wanted Fraudsters Captured in Five Weeks”, 2026-08-18 (official upload, embedded above; published 2026-08-18). Transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, not republished). All figures and characterizations as stated by the speakers.