About a month ago, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Mike Enzi, R-WY, sent a letter to Secretary of Defense James Mattis asking significant questions relating to the progress and cost of the “first-ever” audit of the Department of Defense.
Last week, the Senate Budget Committee held a hearing about the Pentagon audit and related operational reforms. The committee also released a copy of the letter that Norquist had delivered the day before, on March 6, in response to Sen. Enzi’s request that the answers to those questions to Secretary Mattis be delivered by March 15.
The questions were significant, as noted, while one could characterize the responses as less-than-thorough.
The Senate Budget Committee posted a video of the two-hour-long March 7 hearing on their website. It includes statements from John Gibson and David Norquist from the DoD, followed by Q&A from the Senators.
If you don’t have the time to watch, and like to read stuff to take it in more efficiently, I’ve put together a transcription from parts of the first half of the hearing (the official transcript isn’t available yet).
Maybe there is some hope for democracy, in America at least, in that we may have some Senators taking care with the public purse.
Following is a partial transcript of the hearing.
Sen. Enzi: “I want to thank you, Mr. Norquist, for your prompt letter. Had I got it a week from now I would have considered it prompt. That’s actually when I was expecting it. And I’ll be sharing it with members of the committee because there’s a lot of good information in the answers that you gave me.”
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Sen. Whitehouse: “Let me ask one last question, then. DoD contract management has been on GAO’s High Risk report list for almost 25 years. And there are obvious questions about the relationships between the Defense Department, the defense contractors, the defense contractors’ role in Congress, there’s kind of a loop that can exist there, and in addition there’s the revolving door problem that can exist between the Defense Department and these defense contractors, with a view that some of the contracts may not be managed as scrupulously as ideal. Are there things that we should be doing to improve the revolving door issue between the Department of Defense and these contactors to make sure that the relationship with these contractors remains healthy for the taxpayer?”
Gibson: “Senator, just, my specific area of expertise is not contracting and acquisitions. However, I will say it’s my understanding that between the policies in the FIAR and within contracting as well as our ethics, those are in place. I think it’s always our responsibility to follow those to ensure that we truly get to the best place from a contracting standpoint and a conflicts of interest standpoint.”
Sen. Whitehouse: “Do you agree that it’s vital that the contractor should be serving the Defense Department and not vice versa?”
Gibson: "I think leveraging the private sector is absolutely invaluable to us, and that we are the customer and they are the supplier."
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Sen. Kennedy: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Has the audit begun?"
Norquist. "Yes, Senator."
Sen. Kennedy: "OK. I want to thank both of you, and I want to thank President Trump, for doing what the law directs you to do. Under the 1990 statute, what position, but not what person, what position at the Department of Defense was responsible for initiating the audit?"
Norquist: “The audit, I’m not sure how the language is phrased, the audit is conducted by the IG …”
Sen. Kennedy: “Who is responsible at DoD under the 1990 statute for saying ‘I’ve read the law, we’re going to start this audit?’ What position?”
Norquist: “My belief is that because it is called the CFO Act it would be the CFO or the Secretary depending on how the language is written.”
Sen. Kennedy: “Would you get me the name of every CFO who has served in the Department of Defense since this statute was passed?”
Norquist: “I can do that, Senator.”
Sen. Kennedy. “I don’t know where to begin. Sen. Corker is kind of the conscience of the Senate on our deficits, and I first heard him speak about the fact that the Department of Defense had never been audited at a meeting, and frankly I thought he misspoke. Couldn’t believe it. I can’t explain this to my people back home. Every single one of the supports a strong defense. But when you tell them that every other agency of the federal government undergoes an audit, but the Department of Defense was required to 18 years ago and still hasn’t done it, they think I belong in a straightjacket. How did this go on 18 years? Didn’t somebody ever call the CFO and say “have you started the audit yet?”
Norquist: “I will try to attempt to answer your question, but I come from your perspective, which is I’ve viewed the audit as essential …”
Sen. Kennedy: “Well, let me try to put it another way. I have read that the Department of Defense has more federal contracts than all the other federal agencies in the United State put together. Is that right.”
Norquist: “Uh, I don’t know, I don’t know if that includes grants or not, but it might be …”
Sen. Kennedy: “If I asked you for a list of all the contracts, and the amount, could you give it to me?”
Norquist: “Sir that is something we are building, called the Universal Transactions …”
Sen. Kennedy: “You couldn’t give it to me?”
Norquist: “Not easily. It’s a very long list.”
Sen. Kennedy: “We don’t even know, how many contractors we have?”
…
Sen. Kennedy: “Well, we’ve got clearly, some people, and some hogs, who have all four feet and their snout in the trough. And we’ve got to find out who they are, gentlemen. And if we have to pass legislation to require this to be done, and say make it criminal if it’s not done, somebody goes to jail or somebody’s fired, I would appreciate your advice on that. I can’t explain this to my people. I can’t. I’m sorry I went over Mr. Chairman.”
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