Show me the receipts: Pentagon fails financial audit with $824 billion missing; actually, they have never passed an audit

Secretary Lloyd Austin

Important Takeaways:

  • If there’s a better example of the urgent need for the Department of Government Efficiency… I’m unaware of what it is.
  • It was reported on Friday that the Pentagon, the nation’s largest government agency, failed its seventh audit in a row, still unable to fully account for its more than $824 billion budget. Worry not, suggested Pentagon officials, who stressed that they’re making “good progress” toward a clean audit in 2028.
  • According to reports, the Department of Defense — led by often-under-fire Secretary Lloyd Austin –technically earned a disclaimer of opinion, meaning it failed to provide sufficient information to auditors to form an accurate opinion.
  • First question: Why? I’ll venture a guess that the answer is because sufficient information was nowhere to be found, which raises the second question: Why not?
  • Still, Under Secretary of Defense Comptroller and Chief Financial Officer Michael McCord said in a statement that despite the disclaimer of opinion, the Defense Department “has turned a corner in its understanding of the depth and breadth of its challenges.”
    • “I do not say we failed, as I said, we have about half clean opinions. We have half that are not clean opinions. So if someone had a report card that is half good and half not good, I don’t know that you call the student or the report card a failure. We have a lot of work to do, but I think we’re making progress.”
  • We’re not talking about a student’s report card here, bud. We’re talking about close to a trillion dollars and the defense and security of the United States of America.
  • Incidentally, the Pentagon has never passed an audit since the agency became legally obligated to conduct them in 2018.

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