Remarks Of Sen. Patrick Leahy
News Conference On
The Honest Leadership And Accountability In Contracting Act Of 2006
Thursday, March 2, 2006

I am proud to cosponsor this bill, which will create new and better tools to combat fraud, waste and abuse in government contracting.  I commend our chief sponsor, Senator Byron Dorgan, for his leadership on this.

The spirit of Give ‘Em Hell Harry is alive and well today in Senator Dorgan.  One of Harry Truman’s greatest contributions to the nation came not while he was President, but when he was a senator, when he took on the challenge of watchdogging waste, fraud and abuse in defense contracts.  I’m proud to have been part of this modern-day band of watchdogs in recent years as we have stood up for America’s taxpayers and America’s troops.

Waste, fraud and abuse in the name of defense is doubly destructive and doubly offensive, and it should never be tolerated.  It saps resources needed by our troops and it plays the taxpayers for fools, all the while hiding under the cover of national defense.

Just this week we learned that the Army has quietly awarded Halliburton more than $250 million in reimbursements, profits and bonuses that government auditors had concluded were unreasonable and unsupported.

That’s another great government deal for Halliburton, but it’s a very bad deal for our taxpayers and our troops.  In collusion with an Administration that either just doesn’t care, or worse, Halliburton has found a formula for mischief in this Administration’s lax standards for federal contracting.

Our bill establishes new criminal penalties for war profiteers and cheats who, for ill-gotten gain, would exploit the chaos of war, or the devastation of a natural disaster to defraud American taxpayers.  I previously introduced a section of this bill on anti-war profiteering in 2003, and I am pleased that Senator Dorgan has included this legislation in the Honest Leadership and Accountability in Contracting Act.

This legislation also promotes openness and fairness in contracting, and it includes safeguards to end cronyism and eliminate conflicts of interest in contracting decisions.  It also strengthens the federal protections afforded to whistleblowers who alert the public to contract fraud and misconduct.

Every penny of our taxpayers’ money must be protected from waste and federal contract -- which are paid for with taxpayer funds -- should be open and transparent.  This is an accountability bill, and the Senate will face its own accountability moment when this bill comes to a vote.  The taxpayers deserve this to be one of our highest priorities.

# # # # #