DOJ Investigating Biden Administration’s ‘Very Dangerous’ $20 Billion ‘Slush Fund’
The situation revolves around a $20 billion funding initiative linked to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) during the final months of the Biden administration. Specifically, the FBI has become involved in investigating a series of grant programs, such as the National Clean Investment fund and Clean Communities Investment Accelerator, which are suspected of financial mismanagement and lacking proper oversight.
Key points include:
1. **Investigation Details**: FBI agents have questioned EPA staff about the “green bank” initiative,which allegedly involved rapid disbursement of funds with insufficient regulatory control. The EPA administrator and other officials have expressed concerns that certain organizations may have been created solely to take advantage of these funds, raising alarms of potential waste and abuse of taxpayer money.
2. **Financial Mismanagement Allegations**: Reports indicate a pattern of reckless financial management, awarding massive grants to unqualified recipients, and possible conflicts of interest. Such as, a grant of $2 billion was awarded to an association that reported only $100 in revenue.
3. **status of Funds**: The funds in question have been frozen by Citibank, affecting various groups that were expecting to receive money.EPA officials are calling for stringent oversight and accountability regarding the dished-out funds, which they claim were organized poorly and facilitated corruption.
4. **Statements from Authorities**: EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has emphasized the need to recover the misallocated $20 billion and restore regulatory oversight. Critics label the program as a “slush fund,” resulting in grants awarded with minimal restrictions.
this investigation illustrates a serious contention over the distribution and oversight of federal funds aimed at environmental initiatives, reflecting broader disputes about government spending and accountability.
The FBI is now in the picture as the Environmental Protection Agency investigates a $20 billion bonanza that took place in the closing months of the Biden administration.
FBI agents spoke with EPA staffers recently, according to The Washington Post.
Agents are investigating Biden’s “green bank” grant initiative, the National Clean Investment Fund, and the Clean Communities Investment Accelerator programs.
“When we learned about the Biden administration’s scheme to quickly park $20 billion outside the agency, we suspected that some organizations were created out of thin air just to take advantage of this,” an EPA representative said.
“As we continue to learn more about where some of this money went, it is even more apparent how far-reaching and widely accepted this waste and abuse has been,” the representative said.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said that “roughly 20 billion of your tax dollars were parked at an outside financial institution by the Biden EPA.
“This scheme was the first of its kind in EPA history, and it was purposefully designed to obligate all of the money in a rushed job with reduced oversight,” he said.
As a result of Zeldin’s allegations, the money has been frozen by Citibank, which has left the groups without the money they were hoping to receive, according to The New York Times. But that’s not enough for Zeldin. He wants it back.
“It is my utmost priority to get a handle on every dollar that went out the door in this scheme and once again restore oversight and accountability over these funds. This rush job operation is riddled with conflicts of interest and corruption,” Zeldin said, according to the Free Press.
Some grants issued under the program were as high as $7 billion.
“These are some of the biggest grants to individual organizations in American history,” Judge Glock, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, said.
“This clearly was intended from its beginning to be a slush fund,” Glock alleged. “The goal was to give them money with minimal strings and allow them to lend it to people they favored. It is an absolutely wild program. I haven’t seen the likes of in previous government-lending history.
“There’s not really a lot of requirements within the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund to show that this lending is actually working. And these groups can pretty much do what they will with it, and that’s very dangerous,” he told the Free Press.
According to an EPA news release, “a Stacey Abrams linked organization that reported just $100 in revenue in 2023, was chosen to receive $2 billion — that’s 20 million times the organization’s reported revenue.
“To highlight just how unqualified this organization was, the grant agreement provided 90 days to complete “How to Develop a Budget” training even though the organization was instructed to start spending down the balance in the first 21 days of that timeframe,” the news release said.
“Recent findings reveal a pattern of reckless financial management, blatant conflicts of interest, astonishing sums of tax dollars awarded to unqualified recipients, and severe deficiencies in regulatory oversight under the prior administration,” Acting Deputy EPA Administrator W.C. McIntosh wrote in a letter to the Inspector General’s Office calling for the funding to be investigated.
Last month, Zeldin vowed that he would recover the $20 billion.
“The days of irresponsibly shoveling boatloads of cash to far-left activist groups in the name of environmental justice and climate equity are over,” he said.
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