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Biden-Issa Meeting Set for Lame Duck

Vice President Joseph Biden and incoming Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa will huddle during the lame-duck session to discuss oversight of the stimulus, a White House official said Tuesday.

The two planned to meet Monday but had to reschedule. The California Republican reached out to Biden after Tuesday’s elections to let him know that he plans “to begin addressing some of the major shortcomings that relate to how we track stimulus dollars and enforce the reporting requirements,” Issa spokesman Kurt Bardella said.

One of Issa’s top priorities is expanding subpoena power to inspectors general, including the IG who oversees the stimulus, to give them the ability to investigate any federal program. Currently, only one of the 74 inspectors general in the executive branch has such authority.

Bardella called it “unacceptable and easy to remedy” that there is currently no enforcement mechanism to compel recipients of stimulus dollars to report what they do with the money.

“The Congressman intends on pursuing immediate fixes to these problems,” Bardella said. “Hopefully, the White House will join us and support this effort.”

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