Gao Inspector General Parity Act

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1510, the GAO Inspector General Parity Act. I commend both Senator Michael Braun for introducing the bill and also my colleagues, Representatives Robert Garcia and Lisa McClain, for introducing the House companion.

Mr. ROBERT GARCIA of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge the House to pass the bipartisan Government Accountability Office Inspector General Parity Act.

The GAO, of course, is an independent, nonpartisan agency responsible for monitoring government operations to detect waste, fraud, and abuse.

Like other Federal agencies, the GAO has an inspector general watching over their operations, conducting audits, improving efficiency, and ensuring the agency follows the law.

Congress has in the past several years made important reforms to strengthen the inspectors general systems for all of our agencies, to guarantee their independence, and to make sure they have the resources and the tools that they need.

Those reforms regrettably did not apply to the GAO. Our bill is a simple and bipartisan fix to correct these oversights.

Among other reforms, we are going to ensure the GAO has the independent general counsel they need to communicate budget requests directly to Congress without any sort of interference.

The bill did pass the Senate unanimously, thanks to the Senate sponsors, Senator and now Governor-elect Mike Braun and Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee Chairman Gary Peters.

In the House, I am grateful for the support of Chairman Comer, Ranking Member Raskin, and my House co-lead, Representative Lisa McClain of Michigan.

This bill passed unanimously by voice vote from the Oversight Committee, and I urge adoption of this long overdue bill to send to the President's desk and urge it to become law.
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