**To watch Senator Capito’s questioning, click here or on the image above.**

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Yesterday, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), a member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies and Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, questioned U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Michael Regan during a hearing to review the president’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 funding request and budget justification for the EPA.

During her questioning, Senator Capito pressed Administrator Regan on the need for proper oversight of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund due to its high potential for waste, fraud, and abuse. Senator Capito also voiced her disappointment of new EPA regulations released last week in the finalized Clean Power Plan 2.0.

HIGHLIGHTS:

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF PROPER OVERSIGHT OF EPA FUNDING:

SEN. CAPITO: “Would you agree that the EPA offer, excuse me, Office of Inspector General plays an important role in conducting independent, third-party auditing and oversight of the agency's programs?”

ADMINISTRATOR REGAN: “Yes, I would agree.”

SEN. CAPITO: “And would you also agree that the [Inspector General]’s work helps to ensure that the agency's programs are responsibly and effectively implemented, and waste, fraud, and abuse is minimized?”

ADMINISTRATOR REGAN: “Yes.”

SEN. CAPITO: “Well, we agree on that important role of the EPA’s inspector general.”

ON THE NEED FOR OVERSIGHT OF INFLATION REDUCTION ACT (IRA) PROGRAMS:

SEN. CAPITO: “I think it's especially important when it comes to the oversight of the IRA, which was passed with Democrats only voting for it, the IRA appropriated more than $41 billion to the EPA, and established many new programs that require the agency staff to conduct activities that are outside their traditional roles. One example is the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, commonly referred to as the ‘Green Bank’ provision, which I understand is $20 billion that you've just announced is going to eight entities. It's $20 billion going to eight entities. Democrats provided $27 billion for the entire program. The Inspector General has testified before the House, the EPA Inspector General, that the Green Bank and other new IRA programs carry a heightened risk of waste, fraud, and abuse. So, of note, however, the IRA provided not one dollar of additional funding for an EPA Inspector General to independently oversee this $27 billion. By contrast, Inspector Generals of other agencies did get IRA funding. For example, the [Department of Energy] got $20 million to help oversee their funding. It's deeply concerning to me that we are now entering the second year since the IRA became law, and the EPA Inspector General still has not received any additional, dedicated funding to audit more than $40 billion in your EPA programs.”

ON THE POTENTIAL FOR WASTE, FRAUD, AND ABUSE IN THE GREEN BANK PROGRAM:

SEN. CAPITO: “So… how do you say that you're going to finalize these agreements of $20 billion to eight different entities, and when are you finalizing those agreements? In September?”

ADMINISTRATOR REGAN: “Well, we had a very competitive process. We've selected those eight recipients, which I think- I don't want to speak for the [Inspector General] or anyone else— but we chose eight applicants that have demonstrated expertise from an oversight standpoint. That's much better than choosing 30 or 40 applicants that don't have quite the same level of expertise. And, by the way, these eight recipients are distributing the resources. So, these are not— this is not $20 billion going to eight entities for their usage.”

SEN. CAPITO: “That makes it even harder to oversee, I think. I'm not advocating that they are the ones that spend it but, seems to me, if you're going to have 300 different entities, you know, the being the recipients of this, with eight entities putting this money out, I don't see how you're going to keep track of this. I mean, I just think it's so ripe for waste, fraud, and abuse, subjective kinds of deploying of the dollars and that very much concerns me.”

ADMINISTRATOR REGAN: “I think the design of the program, and I'm very proud of the way we've designed this program, we have the metrics, we have the guardrails, we have carefully selected these eight individuals. They are accountable to us. I think we have a ton of oversight mechanisms built in. But listen, some might consider me not as objective, which is why we're asking for the resources in the president's budget to ensure that our Inspector General feels comfortable with the actions that we're taking.”

SEN. CAPITO: “Well, I'll end there on that. I would say, it's just amazing to me that the authors of the IRA wouldn't want to be more accountable to the dollars that were being spent—billions of dollars being spent—in a whole new program wouldn't have included that in their initial proposal.”

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