Comer, Fallon Issue Statement on Department of Energy’s Refusal to Reform Oversight Controls, Protect Taxpayers

WASHINGTON—House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) and Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs Chairman Pat Fallon (R-Texas) issued the following joint statement after the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Inspector General (OIG) released an interim report exposing the Biden Administration’s non-compliance with conflict-of-interest regulations that are intended to protect American taxpayers:

“Despite repeated calls to reform its deficient oversight infrastructure, the Department of Energy’s Loans Programs Office continues to leave the door wide open for waste, fraud, and abuse. Today’s OIG report confirms the DOE is administering hundreds of billions of dollars without an adequate system in place to track conflicts of interest or protect U.S. taxpayer dollars. Bad actors now have heightened opportunities to take advantage of rushed funding, and no one is the wiser. The Biden Administration should immediately implement the corrective actions recommended by OIG to ensure taxpayer dollars are protected, oversight systems are properly implemented, and DOE is held accountable to the American people.”

Background:

On April 18, 2023, the Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs held a hearing titled, “Spending on Empty: How the Biden Administration’s Unprecedented Spending Increased Risk of Waste, Fraud, and Abuse at the Department of Energy.” Subcommittee members discussed with witnesses the lack of existing oversight infrastructure within the Department of Energy to track the spending of taxpayer dollars. The Biden Administration and Congressional Democrats more than doubled the Department of Energy’s budget in a single year, which exposes taxpayer dollars to increased risk of waste, fraud, and abuse. Subcommittee members also discussed Democrats’ radical Green New Deal policies that ignore the punitive impact on American consumers and allow foreign adversaries like China to continue polluting at significantly higher rates.

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