Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 757.0

529US3

Unit: $U55

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FISCHER v. UNITED STATES

Thomas, J., dissenting

level and quality of care envisioned by the program. Cf. Sa-
linas, 522 U. S., at 61 (stating that acceptance of bribes by
an ofﬁcial of a jail housing federal prisoners pursuant to an
agreement with the Government “was a threat to the integ-
rity and proper operation of the federal program”).

Other cases may present questions requiring further ex-
amination and elaboration of the term “beneﬁts.” Here it
sufﬁces to hold that health care providers such as the one
defrauded by petitioner receive beneﬁts within the meaning
of the statute. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
afﬁrmed.

It is so ordered.

Justice Thomas, with whom Justice Scalia joins,

dissenting.

In my view, the only persons who receive “beneﬁts” under
Medicare are the individual elderly and disabled Medicare
patients, not the medical providers who serve them. Pay-
ments made by the Federal Government to a Medicare
health care provider to reimburse the provider for the costs
of services rendered, rather than to provide ﬁnancial aid to
the hospital, are not “beneﬁts.”

I respectfully dissent.

I

The jurisdictional provision of 18 U. S. C. § 666(b) requires
that an “organization, government, or agency receiv[e], in
any one year period, beneﬁts in excess of $10,000 under a
Federal program involving a grant, contract, subsidy, loan,
guarantee, insurance, or other form of Federal assistance.”
As the Court notes, an organization is not a beneﬁciary of
a federal program merely because the organization receives
federal funds. Ante, at 677, 681. Rather, as the Court ad-
mits, a “beneﬁt” is something that “guards, aids, or promotes
well-being”; “useful aid”; or a “payment, gift [as] ﬁnan-
cial help in time of sickness, old age, or unemployment.”
Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 204 (1971).