Thomas Catenacci of the Washington Free Beacon describes one example of a poor Biden-Harris federal policy.
The Biden-Harris administration’s $3.5 billion initiative to “weatherize” low-income homes through climate-friendly and energy-efficient upgrades is being mismanaged and is vulnerable to “fraud, waste, and abuse,” according to a top government watchdog.In a report published late Tuesday, the Department of Energy’s inspector general found that 11 states receiving funds under the agency’s Weatherization Assistance Program blew past the legal limit of per unit cost while 21 states and territories did not submit legally required quarterly reports detailing progress on time. Another 16 states and territories have received federal funding to weatherize more than 52,000 units but have yet to complete a single project with that funding.
“This lack of performance is a red flag that warrants immediate department attention,” the inspector general wrote in the report sent to Department of Energy leadership last week.The apparent mismanagement of the program is the latest black eye for the Biden-Harris administration’s efforts to fund a wide range of green energy programs as part of its aggressive climate agenda. Weatherization has been singled out by the administration as a “critical” tool for combating global warming, with Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm recently stating the program would ensure all Americans have access to “clean energy tools.”
The report also comes after the EPA’s inspector general conducted multiple investigations into the Clean School Bus Program, finding that that program is similarly falling short of oversight requirements.
Funding for both the Weatherization Assistance Program and Clean School Bus Program was earmarked under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which President Joe Biden signed into law in November 2021. That law and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act earmarked hundreds of billions of dollars for climate programs, which the administration has raced to get out the door in recent months, ahead of the upcoming election, the Associated Press reported.
