The Pentagon has failed another
audit but with an expected $770 Billion budgeted for the Defense
Department in fiscal year 2022, Keeping track of all this money
is no simple matter. It took the Department of
Homeland Security a decade to Pass its audit. And it's a
fraction of the size of the Defense Department Old systems for tracking funds,
a slow bureaucracy and the sheer Size of the US Defense apparatus
have kept audits from passing Since they began in late 2017. We need to impose some kind of a
penalty. Personally, I would like to
spend as little in the military As possible while achieving the
important national security Goals that the country has and
the people expect from the Country. After four straight failures,
why does the Department of Defense struggle to pass an
audit? The Department of Defense is
responsible for defending U.S. Interests around the world.
Since 1988, the budget has grown From over 634 billion to over
724 billion in 2020. But the Defense budget as a percentage
of the total gross domestic Product has actually dropped in
the same period from 5.7% to 3.5%. Like any organization in
America, any large organization Anyway, the single biggest
expense on the balance sheet is People and it's no different for
the Defense Department, The size of the budget is
constantly a subject of debate. But for lawmakers to make
informed decisions, they need Good data, The financial system that you
have in DOD right now are set up To control taxpayers dollars to
guarantee that there is not Going to be unauthorized use of
it. So every use every dollar And cent is accounted for, you
can see that by the violations Being extremely low. It is one of the largest
organizations on planet Earth,
Right three quarters of a
trillion dollars, direct Payroll, 3 million people.
Congress has plenty of data on The department, but they don't
have as useful data. And they Don't have visualized, you know,
content that's helpful to them To do their oversight job. They're responsible for the
security of the United States if In fact, their audit systems are
outdated. If in fact, they can't Do an audit and give us a
picture of what they're Spending. I kind of worry about
what they're doing on the really Important stuff as it relates to
terrorism, as it relates to our National security issues over
there at the Pentagon. One of the main problems with
the Department of Defense's Accounting stems from the older
methods still use today to track And organize funds. You know, there is a myth out
there that just because the Department can't pass the audit,
it doesn't know where it's Spending its money, and it does.
But what it doesn't do well is Tracking at an enterprise level. One example of items found in
the recent audit was that the Navy found a warehouse for $126
million in aircraft parts that Was not accounted for. According
to the Government Accountability Office. It's items like this one
that makes some critics ask if The Pentagon's overall budget
could be more focused and Efficient. What you have right now is a
Pentagon that is everything for Everyone. The DoD is trying to
heal cancer and heal Planet Earth at the same time. And it's
always tacking on more missions, It's the matter of efficiency is
what are you making it efficient For The umbrella of services under
the Department of Defense such As the Army, the Navy, the Air
Force, and the Marines along With other agencies and offices
creates layers of financial Bureaucracy and differing
methods of achieving similar Goals.
Individually, some of the
services are better than others. So the Marine Corps has got to
clean audit. So you know, I Think we will continue to see
that kind of progress and Congress should expect that. But
secondly, even just going Through the whole process of
reorienting the culture and the Department to to have a clean
sheet audit has contributed to, You know, its own set of
benefits. So for example, the Army used to laboriously input
property and asset transfer Documents into a system
essentially by hand. By bringing In more people into the audit
process, the army was able to Automate that and say, 60,000
man hours a year. That's great, Small but great, you know,
important steps that I want to Continue to see. Some members of Congress have
tried to institute a penalty for A failed Pentagon audit Maybe they just don't want to do
it, because they're misspending Tax dollars, and that's why I
introduced the audit the Pentagon act of 2021. The audit the Pentagon act lays
out a punitive system where a Failed audit can result in a
budget drop and repeated Failures increases this sort of
penalty. The bill was introduced By Democratic Representative
Barbara Lee and is co sponsored In the house by Republican
Representative Michael Burgess. It is also sponsored in the
Senate by Senator Bernie Sanders, but even with
bipartisan support, it has not Managed to get much traction in
Congress. The Pentagon is also Where discretionary resources
Live, which is how some Priorities can be funded without
going through Congress directly, Such as when President Trump
redirected funds from the DOD to Border wall construction. Both parties are to blame on
that, since DoD is where the Bulk of the discretionary
resources live, it goes to that That old joke like why do people
rob the bank? Because that's Where the money is. So if you
want to find your pet project,
You go to DOD, because that's
where the money is, After the withdrawal from
Afghanistan, some question why Defense spending wasn't slated
to drop. So the defense firm has two
budgets, they have sort of the Standing professional force, and
what it costs to train, equip And feed them essentially. And
then there is this conflict and Contingency money. And that's
usually on the credit card. Right. So you debt finance, so
to speak. And it's off the books Separate from the standing
defense budget, which you you Know, maintain for sort of
global stability to turn it Against China's or operations
and anywhere. Yes, spending Should go down. The challenge is
explaining to the American People that it goes down on
something that was debt financed Anyway, and so the base defense
budget doesn't really fall much. Another issue is incorrect
payments or payments that should Not have been made for traveling
expenses, which constituted 11 Point 4 billion in misallocated
funds. Part of the blame for This is the antiquated travel
payment systems. And another Factor is the sheer number of
people processing requests. The Department of Defense's
budget has trended up as a Percentage of GDP since 2018.
And with competition with China In Russia heating up it likely
isn't going to trend down Anytime soon. The Pentagon understands that
members of Congress are fearful Of doing anything because they
believe that they would appear As being soft on national
security when in fact, it's just The opposite. We want resources
to support our troops to provide The better quality of life for
them. Despite all of the problems the
auditor has shown progress, the Department of Defense has stated
that business reform efforts Have resulted in 37 billion in
savings from 2017 through 2021, Please, The department will get that
clean sheet. It's just going to Be probably another half decade
or so. So better use of member
Time is to focus on that
enterprise level oversight to Push the department into the
21st century, right. Commercial Technologies and data analytics
and other kinds of AI and other Software tools that can help the
department better explain what It does not just track what it
does. There needs to be a good
understanding between Congress And DOD on what is oversight
water, it is the information That you need. What are the
proper financial data that you Require? Does it doesn't need to
be a snapshot? Or can it be Alive information for quarter
that and those things can be Talked and negotiated between
the two organizations. That's Why there are quarterly O and M
reports for instance that Congress received, could those
be replaced with, I don't know, A nexus to the system that
question staffers can view the System but not modify for
instance. But those are the type Of conversations that need to
take place to assure that DOD Financial systems are responsive
to congressional in Congressional needs into the
transparency required to operate In a democratic society.
