US Senators Table Bipartisan Bill Demanding 'Clean' Pentagon Audit

The Pentagon has failed its last five audits and now cannot account for more than $1 trillion in equipment and other assets paid for by US taxpayers. Now a crossbench group of senators is demanding transparency.

A bipartisan group of US senators have launched a bill to force the Department of Defense (DoD) to finally deliver a "clean audit."

The draft legislation was led by Republican Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley and Vermont's Bernie Sanders, the left-wing independent who has twice sought the Democratic presidential nomination.

The Pentagon failed its fifth audit in a row last November, failing to account for as much as 39 per cent of its $3.5 trillion of listed assets — although DoD Comptroller Mike McCord insisted: "I would not say that we flunked."

"From buying $14,000 toilet seats to losing track of warehouses full of spare parts, the Department of Defense has been plagued by wasteful spending for decades," Grassley charged on Wednesday. "Every dollar the Pentagon squanders is a dollar not used to support service members, bolster national security or strengthen military readiness. The Department of Defense should have to meet the same annual auditing standards as every other agency."

"The Pentagon and the military industrial complex have been plagued by a massive amount of waste, fraud, and financial mismanagement for decades," said Sanders.

“If we are serious about spending taxpayer dollars wisely and effectively, we have got to end the absurdity of the Pentagon being the only agency in the federal government that has never passed an independent audit,” he added.

Other GOP sponsors were perennial dissident Republican Rand Paul of Kentucky, Utah's Mike Lee and Mike Braun from Indiana.

The Democrats backing the bill were both Massachusetts senators, Elizabeth Warren — another 2020 presidential hopeful — and Ed Markey, along with Oregon's Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin.

Paul stressed that "accountability and transparency are the bedrock of responsible democracy."

"No institution is above scrutiny, especially the Department of Defense which has the largest budget of any federal agency and is charged with carrying out the greatest constitutional responsibility," the Kentucky senator said. "We need to ensure that our defense spending is accurate, accountable, and in the best interest of American taxpayers."

On Tuesday, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said the DoD could send an extra $6.2 billion-worth of the US military's arms to Ukraine after it applied commercial business asset depreciation models to reduce the balance-sheet value of its stocks.

But that does not reflect the real cost to taxpayers of replacing equipment, which has only increased over time. Each of the 31 M1 Abrams tanks gifted to the Kiev regime will cost almost $9 million dollars to replace, more than double the $4.3 million unit price in the early 90s.

The unit price of the F-16 jet fighter — which the US and its allies are considering for future military aid to Ukraine — has risen from $4.8 million in 1980 to $63 million in 2021, a 13-fold increase.