I’m really glad that he’s aware of the moral implications of what he did.

Doesn’t sound like you are though. I mean, you just admitted he committed fraud in order to appropriate money meant for people who actually needed it, and now:

• you want to justify it by saying “clearly the government wasn’t holding back assistance to anyone at the time” as though it being an honour system at the time made what he did okay;
• you’re pulling that after you first tried to paper over that they weren’t just any old loans he took out; in addition to which
• you want to try and paint me as the bad guy.

You serious, dude? You’re aware that I didn’t commit fraud during the pandemic, right? And it wasn’t hard either, I just didn’t apply for relief I wasn’t eligible for. You’re aware he wasn’t scamming a bank, he was scamming people in need?

It’s okay to make mistakes, but he is lucky he’s not in prison, and if he can own what he did like an adult then so can you.