The Administration’s Latest Attack on Oversight

During his first weeks in office, President Donald Trump resumed his war on watchdogs by illegally firing 18 inspectors general. Now, his administration is launching another damaging attack by refusing to release congressionally approved funding to the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE).

CIGIE was established by Congress to play a vital role in the work of inspectors general, supporting their work exposing waste, fraud, and abuse of power within federal agencies. It protects taxpayer dollars and helps ensure our government is accountable to the people — or it did, until 12:00 a.m. on October 1. Congress must demand answers from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and insist that the funds it has already appropriated for CIGIE are released immediately.

How CIGIE Serves the American People

Helping whistleblowers expose waste, fraud, and abuse

CIGIE functions as a kind of service provider, resource hub, and accountability mechanism for the inspector general community. One critical service it provides is a platform that hosts websites for offices of inspectors general (OIG) — an important source of information and opportunity for disclosure for potential whistleblowers.

While we don’t know the number of whistleblower disclosures that reach IGs through these sites each year, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) OIG hotline reports receiving 30,000 – 40,000 contacts annually. In a recent letter to Congress requesting answers about its funding, CIGIE reported that nearly 40% of independent OIG websites are hosted through its platform, including those of the VA, the Department of Justice, and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.

CIGIE’s funding expired at 12:00 a.m. on October 1, and by the start of that workday, the vast majority of the OIG websites it hosts, including those with directions on how to find and use special hotlines to report waste, fraud, and abuse, were offline. The Department of Justice’s Office of Inspector General page was gone, as was the page of the office of the Defense Intelligence Agency’s inspector general. Their resources are replaced by a single message: “Due to a lack of apportionment of funds, this website is currently unavailable.”

Helping IGs, Congress, and the public hold agencies accountable for waste, fraud, and abuse

CIGIE also provides valuable transparency into the reports and investigations produced by inspectors general. Its website, Oversight.gov, serves as a repository for OIG publications from across the federal government. Compiling them in one place and providing users with robust search and filter options, CIGIE allows congressional staff, reporters, government watchdogs, and the public access to the work produced by individual OIGs. For anyone serious about fighting corruption and protecting taxpayer dollars, this service is indispensable.

For example, a quick search of reports posted on Oversight.gov just in the last two weeks yielded a report from the Social Security Administration IG revealing that the agency incorrectly denied over 24,000 claims, incorrectly withholding over $90 million from Americans; an audit concluding that high ranking staff in the Office of Personnel Management ignored security and privacy controls in their rush to set up a cross-government email system earlier this year; and a report summary from the Department of Justice flagging that a now-retired assistant director at the FBI organized a work trip around ideal vacation spots, and “spent 4 days at a beach resort, at government expense.”

All of these reports were accessible the night of September 30. By the morning of October 1, they too were replaced by an empty site and a site not found message.

Protecting our taxpayer dollars from waste, fraud, and abuse

Another service CIGIE provides to OIGs is training that builds capacity in individual inspector general offices, which are essential in protecting against waste, fraud, and abuse within government agencies. CIGIE provides the opportunity for OIG staff and inspectors general themselves to come together and learn with and from one another. Through its peer review process, for example, CIGIE ensures that OIGs hold one another to high standards of quality in their reports. And through its Training Institute, CIGIE offers in-person and virtual courses to help staff improve their skills in areas like auditing, criminal investigation, and leadership. CIGIE noted in its letter to Congress that in the last fiscal year, 5,700 OIG staff participated in its trainings. CIGIE also recommends candidates for vacant inspector general positions to help ensure that these roles are filled by qualified and experienced people.

Holding Inspectors General Accountable to Congress and the Public

Inspectors general occupy a unique space in government: They are intended to be independent, but that also means they need their own accountability mechanisms. CIGIE provides that through its Integrity Committee, one of the bodies to which people can report concerns about inspectors general. The Integrity Committee assesses those reports and, at times, undertakes investigations and may even recommend action. Given the important work inspectors general do to try to keep our government honest and the access they have to sensitive information, whistleblower information, and more, IGs themselves must behave in a way that is above reproach. CIGIE works to ensure they do so.

The Most Recent in a Series of Attacks on Oversight

Since January, POGO has reported and analyzed the dismantling of oversight throughout our federal government. From the mass firing of IGs (CIGIE maintained an online IG Vacancy tracker), to the shuttering of offices in DHS that investigate and document civil rights abuses, to compromising the Office of Government Ethics within the executive branch, we’ve watched as guardrail after guardrail has been weakened or collapsed.

In withholding congressionally appropriated funds from CIGIE, the administration is not just claiming for itself Congress’s power of the purse: it’s also using that power to demolish yet another system for accountability.

In a quote provided to the Washington Post, an OMB spokesperson explained the logic behind these cuts.

“Inspectors general are meant to be impartial watchdogs identifying waste and corruption on behalf of the American people ... Unfortunately, they have become corrupt, partisan, and in some cases, have lied to the public. The American people will no longer be funding this corruption.”

While it’s hard to understand why one would address corrupt inspectors general by defunding the council that investigates inspectors general charged with corruption, this statement makes the administration’s position on the inspector general system crystal clear.

Congress Must Intervene

This statement, however, neglects two important facts.

First, the administration cannot unilaterally decide how to fund the federal government. Congress does that.

And secondly — and more to the point — inspectors general serve the American people. They investigate wrongdoing in our government and expose abuses of power. Last year alone, they saved taxpayers $136.9 billion.

They are an indispensable guardrail against waste and corruption, and CIGIE is indispensable to them.

This moment offers a rare opportunity for members of Congress to join together across the aisle to insist this government better serve their constituents. We encourage all members of Congress to support Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Susan Collins (R-ME), who were leading proponents in the legislation establishing CIGIE, in pushing OMB and OMB director Russell Vought for answers. Further, each and every member of Congress must insist that the funds Congress has already appropriated to CIGIE be released so the council can return to its important work.