Office of Inspector General Archives

Commentary: The Federal Housing Agency Hasn’t Gotten Its Economic House in Order, Under Both Parties

July 19, 2024 RealClearWire

Paul Fishbein’s conviction on rent fraud charges in New York City last year was a feast for the tabloids.

The story was crazy enough to get readers to click. Prosecutors said that Fishbein, 51, somehow convinced local housing agencies that he owned dilapidated apartment buildings that he didn’t, enabling him to move in tenants and skim government rent subsidies meant for lower-income, disabled, and elderly residents. Fishbein kept the con going for more than years. His take: $1.8 million.

Navy’s Suicide Rate Soars to Record High in First Three Months of 2024

July 15, 2024 Michigan Star Staff

The Navy reported a record-high number of suicides in the first three months of 2024 amid previous reports of poor quality of life and high stress for members of the branch, according to new data from the Pentagon.

There have been 24 reported suicides among sailors in the first quarter of 2024, the highest quarterly sum the service has seen since 2018, which was the first year such data was made available, according to the Pentagon. A service wellness survey conducted in February by the Navy found that more than a third of sailors were suffering from “severe or extreme levels of stress” in 2023, up from roughly a quarter who reported so in 2019.

‘Incompetence’: Pentagon Doesn’t Know How Much Money It Sent to Chinese Entities for Risky Virus Research

June 22, 2024 Michigan Star Staff

The Department of Defense (DOD) does not know how much money it directly or indirectly sent to Chinese entities to conduct research on viruses with pandemic potential, according to a new report by the DOD’s Office of Inspector General (OIG).

The OIG’s report found that DOD has supplied Chinese entities — whether directly or indirectly via subgrants — with taxpayer cash to research pathogens and the enhancement thereof, but the exact figure is unknown because of “limitations” in the DOD’s internal tracking system. Government funding for such research in China has come under scrutiny since the coronavirus pandemic, which multiple government entities believe started when an engineered virus leaked from a Chinese laboratory that was hosting U.S. government-backed gain-of-function research.

New Legislation Would Revoke Tax-Exempt Status of Nonprofits Funding Hamas, Other Terrorists

December 11, 2023 The Center Square

Proposed new legislation would revoke the tax-exempt status of any nonprofit organization that is providing material support for terrorist groups.

The bipartisan bill, introduced by U.S. Rep. David Kustoff, R-Tenn., and U.S. Rep. Brad Schneider, D-Ill., comes out of the House Ways and Means Committee, which unanimously approved the legislation last week.

Biden Energy Department Ill-Prepared to Combat Fraud as it Spends Billions on Infrastructure

November 27, 2023November 27, 2023 Just the News

The U.S. Energy Department faces major management challenges ranging from hacking vulnerabilities to foreign espionage and could create “massive new risks to the taxpayer” as it spends tens of billions of dollars in new spending from President Joe Biden’s signature infrastructure initiative, the agency’s internal watchdog warns.

The Office of Inspector General offered a stark assessment of the department under Secretary Jennifer Granholm, pointedly warning losses from fraud in the current infrastructure spending could mirror that seen during the COVID pandemic, where taxpayers now lost an estimated $200 billion government wide.

The Biden Administration’s Record of Caring for Veterans Raises Alarm

May 29, 2023 Just the News

Early in the debt ceiling crisis, the Biden administration tried to scare veterans into believing Republicans might cut their benefits, which did not happen. But the administration’s own treatment of the nation’s warriors suffers from glaring failures ranging from lax security to benefits delayed by unwarranted tests.

The failures were laid bare in a series of reports and memos made public by the Department of Veterans Affairs’ internal watchdog, the Office of Inspector General, shortly before Memorial Day and reviewed by Just the News.

Internal Memos Call into Question National Archives Narrative to Congress on Trump Documents

April 11, 2023 Just the News

For months, the National Archives and Records Administration has insisted it had nothing to do with the federal criminal investigation into memos containing classified markings that were found at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate since it referred the matter to the FBI in February 2022.

“When NARA identified items marked as classified national security information within the 15 boxes, NARA referred this issue to the DOJ,” acting Archivist Debra Wall wrote Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio), now the House Intelligence Committee chairman, on August 16. “Since that time, the DOJ has been exclusively responsible for all aspects of this investigation, and NARA has not been involved in the DOJ investigation or any searches that it has conducted.”

Commentary: The Border Isn’t Just a Crisis, It’s Also a Grift

April 7, 2023 Michigan Star Staff

There was a time not long ago when Americans would read news stories about obscene levels of corruption in other countries and feel justified in a sense of superiority. Things might not be perfect here, but at least we weren’t that bad. No more. We have now reached the point here where it is that bad. We have surrendered the right to look down our noses at any other country.
One of the most glaring examples of this today can be found in the crisis raging at the U.S.-Mexico border. There have been endless videos of hordes of migrants traversing the Rio Grande and walking into the United States, but that is just a part of the total picture.

Senator Joni Ernst Commentary: EcoHealth Can’t Be Trusted with Taxpayer Money – or Bats

January 31, 2023January 31, 2023 Michigan Star Staff

Nearly two years ago, I requested an investigation by the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) into EcoHealth Alliance —the shady organization that funneled taxpayer money into China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) to conduct risky research on coronaviruses.

The investigation came after we learned that EcoHealth was spending our tax dollars on dangerous experiments in Wuhan, China, and was not disclosing information about those projects to the public, as required by law.

Chicago School Audit Finds Nearly 500 Sexual Complaints Filed in 2022

January 9, 2023January 8, 2023 Just the News

Chicago school officials this week revealed that the school system recorded nearly 500 sexual complaints over the last year, with investigators stressing their inability to respond to a majority of all complaints they receive.

The Chicago Board of Education Office of Inspector General said in its 2022 annual report that it received 470 “sexual allegation” complaints over the course of FY2022.

Inspector General: ‘DHS Could Do More to Address Threats of Domestic Terrorism’

July 11, 2022July 11, 2022 The Center Square

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security “could do more to address the threats of domestic terrorism,” the Office of Inspector General concluded in a newly published report. The findings come after DHS has acknowledged that at least 50 people on the terrorist watch list have entered the U.S. illegally through the southern border since President Joe Biden has been in office.

The OIG found that DHS doesn’t have “staff dedicated to long term oversight and coordination of its efforts to combat domestic terrorism” and unless it puts in place “a cohesive long-term approach,” the agency charged with preventing terrorism “may not be able to proactively prevent and protect the Nation from this evolving threat.”

Ten Michigan Churches to Share in $1.24M Energy Efficiency Grant

July 3, 2022July 2, 2022 The Center Square

Ten Michigan church congregations, each of low-income nature, will share in a $1.24 million grant award for energy-efficiency upgrades.

Federal money will be appropriated through the Sacred Spaces Clean Energy program to “advance environmental justice and reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy said in making the announcement Wednesday.

Small Business Administration Spends $14.8 Million in Questionable Costs for Underutilized Small Business Portal

January 25, 2022January 24, 2022 Michigan Star Staff

This week’s Golden Horseshoe is awarded to the Small Business Administration for lax oversight of a $25 million grant for the creation of a COVID-19 relief small business portal that ran up $14.8 million in questionable costs for an underutilized hub, according to a report by the agency’s Office of Inspector General.

The SBA’s Office of Entrepreneurial Development (OED) received $25 million through the CARES Act to create a portal to help small businesses during the pandemic. An $18.6 million grant was awarded for the Resource Partner Training Portal program, but the intended results were not achieved. A combination of a failed marketing strategy to let small businesses know of the portal’s existence and unsupported or unallowable invoices led the inspector general to question $14.8 million in costs.

“SBA did not did not ensure the grant recipient developed and implemented an effective marketing and outreach strategy to ensure the hub successfully achieved the legislative purpose of the CARES Act,” Inspector General Hannibal “Mike” Ware stated in the report.

Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency Warned Twice Before Errors, Emails Show

October 20, 2021October 19, 2021 The Center Square

Emails show that in May 2020, the federal government warned Michigan’s Unemployment Insurance (UIA) about its lax jobless aid qualification questions. Despite a second warning as early as Jan. 6, 2021, the UIA still didn’t fix its mistakes.

The unheeded warnings are now costing nearly 600,000 Michiganders stress as well as potentially thousands of dollars to repay Pandemic Unemployment Assistance benefits erroneously paid out.