Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, wants to know why President Joe Biden has failed to appoint inspectors-general (IG) at the departments of Treasury and State, as well as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
That three highly visible watchdog jobs remain unfilled in Biden’s third year in the Oval Office is a bipartisan issue, as Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) is raising the same concerns. Hassan chairs the Senate’s Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.
“To date, the U.S. Department of State (State) IG position has been vacant for over 1,100 days with no nominee; the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) IG position has been vacant for over 850 days; and the U.S. Department of the Treasury (Treasury) IG position has been vacant for almost 1,500 days,” Comer wrote.
“We write to express our concern that these vacancies with no nominee are limiting transparency and holding back efforts to ensure the federal government is working as efficiently as possible on behalf of the American people,“ he wrote. ”We urge you to expeditiously nominate highly qualified candidates to fill these vacancies.”
Hassan and Grassley reminded Biden that “the absence of an IG at the Department of the Treasury is concerning due to the challenges it faces in areas including: management of cyber threats, anti-money-laundering/terrorist financing in conjunction with Bank Secrecy Act enforcement, as well as oversight of portions of CARES Act spending.
There are 72 presidentially appointed IGs whose job is to ferret out waste, fraud, and abuse at federal departments and agencies. The IGs are presidential appointees who answer to Congress. Since their creation in 1978, the IGs have exposed trillions of wasted tax dollars.
The IGs have also sometimes found themselves at the center of major national political scandals, as in 2019 when Department of Justice IG Michael Horowitz exposed multiple FBI abuses and misrepresentations in four bureau applications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court (FISA). The applications were approved on the basis of false or incomplete information and resulted in substantial surveillance of multiple officials in President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign in the Russiagate controversy.
Comer alluded to the IG’s importance in political controversies, saying he’s concerned that Biden has “left prolonged vacancies for the position of IG for State and USAID at a time when State and USAID are engaged in sensitive matters impacting U.S. national security interests around the world.
“These challenges include the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, civil unrest in Sudan, the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, and increased aggression by China, Iran, and North Korea. The prolonged vacancy for IG at Treasury could also hamper robust oversight of COVID-19 related spending and mitigation of financial risk and instability,” Comer told Biden.
“Ongoing vacancies weaken IG offices, because temporary leadership is not well-suited for long-term planning and decision making. At a minimum, leaving in place acting IGs for prolonged periods of time sends a message to the American people that oversight and accountability is not a priority for the Biden Administration. With respect to State and USAID, it also raises questions as to whether the Biden Administration has intentionally left these positions vacant to avoid increased scrutiny into the impact of its policy decisions,” Comer wrote.
A White House spokesman didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for information on the status of the candidate search for potential IG nominees. A spokesman for Rep. Jamie Raskin, the Maryland Democrat who is the ranking member of the accountability panel, also didn’t respond to a request for comment on Comer’s letter to Biden.
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