California governor accuses Dr Oz of discrimination over fraud claims in LA’s Armenian community

A new front in the battle between the California governor, Gavin Newsom, and the Trump administration has opened over a video in which the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) administrator, Mehmet Oz, visits Los Angeles and alleges members of its Armenian community orchestrated large-scale healthcare fraud.

The days-long public scuffle on social media escalated on Thursday evening, when Newsom announced his office was filing a civil rights complaint with the US Department of Health and Human Services accusing Oz of discrimination.

Newsom’s office argued in the complaint that Oz “spewed baseless and racially charged allegations” that risked chilling participation in hospice and home care programs among the community targeted. The governor’s office noted the claims had “already caused real-world harm” by dampening business at an Armenian bakery that is shown in the video.

Oz and the CMS did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the complaint or the content of the video, and they have not publicly shared details that confirm the fraud being alleged.

The video posted on social media earlier this week shows the CMS administrator visiting the Van Nuys neighborhood of Los Angeles and pointing to a four-block radius that he says is home to 42 hospices, suggesting potential fraud. He references a business that he says was part of a $16m fraud scheme.

Then, while standing in front of a building that includes an Armenian bakery, he alleges that roughly $3.5bn in hospice and home care fraud has taken place in Los Angeles and “quite a bit of it” was run by “the Russian Armenian mafia”.

Oz, whose parents emigrated to the US from Turkey, describes the Armenian script on the businesses’ signs while the camera pans to the bakery.

“You notice the lettering and language behind me is of that dialect,” he says in the video. He also claims there “has not been a lot of attention on these problems” in California.

Newsom disputed the claims in the video and noted on social media that California had revoked more than 280 hospice licenses and banned new licenses starting in 2022 because of concerns about fraud. Then the two leaders exchanged multiple sharp attacks in a back-and-forth on social media.

The feud is among many that have sprung up between Newsom, seen as a potential Democratic presidential candidate for 2028, and the Republican administration of Donald Trump.

Newsom and the president have clashed over issues ranging from the Trump administration’s national guard deployment in Los Angeles to the president’s efforts to block California’s 2035 ban on new gas-powered cars, a nationwide first.

Oz’s video also points to a larger Trump administration effort to spotlight fraud around the country. That effort comes after allegations of fraud involving daycare centers run by Somali Americans in Minneapolis prompted a huge immigration crackdown in the midwestern city, resulting in widespread protests. Two people have been fatally shot in the city by federal agents this month.