DeSantis: Unpaid unemployment claimants have missing information on applications

The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity’s claims dashboard said Friday that it now has paid more than 740,000 people a total of over $1.86 billion as of May 14.

Gov. Ron DeSantis at his press conference on Friday said he’s glad money is going out the door.

He told reporters the unemployment website was not prepared for the influx of applications and “had to basically be redesigned.”

When pressed about people still waiting for benefits since mid-March, the governor said those applications likely have missing information.

“I will tell you a lot of the applications have been incomplete. So especially if you’re in that late March period, you should have been processed by now, if your application was complete and if you’re eligible. So if they haven’t been, I want those names, we’ll bring them over to the agency later today and see if we can get working on it.”

The DEO said the CONNECT website will be unavailable to existing claimants again this weekend as they work to process claims and make payments. Users should be able to log on again Monday at 8 a.m.

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