The Pentagon Has Avoided Audit For 27 Years

Not sure where your tax dollars are going? Nobody really is.

By Michael D. Ostrolenk

On Tuesday, the U.S. Representatives passed a Pentagon budget that called for $700 billion in defense spending—more than what even the Trump administration had asked for, and tens of billions more than the current defense spending caps. To achieve this budget, which is expected to sail through the Senate after the Thanksgiving break, Congress will have to raise the caps set into place during the Budget Control Act. But if there is a will—which there certainly is, considering the powerful defense industry lobby, coupled with members’ own special interests for their districts—there is a way. But how indeed does this money get spent? An open secret in Washington is that the Pentagon, by far the largest if not most byzantine agency in the federal government, has never been audited. Sure, Congress mandated in 1990 that it be audited, but not surprisingly, the leviathan agency never complied, with no consequences to speak of. Reports abound about bureaucracy, contractor pushback, and at least one “historic” Marine Corps audit in 2015 that turned out to be less than thorough due to internal politics. Bottom line, the audits just aren’t happening.

There is a movement among Congress’ few but determined reformers to force the Pentagon’s hand. Congressman Michael Burgess, a conservative Republican from Texas, recently introduced H.R. 3079, the Audit the Pentagon Act of 2017...more