Passed
384 Yea0 Nay46 Not voting2/3 required
HR-8466-119
Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Sponsored by Andy Biggs (R-AZ)
What it does
This bill would require federal agencies to develop and submit plans to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for preventing fraud and improper payments in federal emergency spending, such as disaster relief or pandemic assistance. OMB would issue guidance — updated every three years — based on existing Government Accountability Office (GAO) frameworks for fraud risk management. Agencies would be required to revise their plans at least every three years, and OMB would annually submit all plans to Congress along with implementation support and legislative recommendations for future emergency appropriations.
Who benefits
Taxpayers broadly, who would see stronger safeguards on emergency federal spending. Legitimate disaster and pandemic relief recipients, whose programs may face less scrutiny or clawback risk if fraud is reduced systemically. Congress, which would gain annual visibility into agency fraud-prevention plans. Inspectors General and oversight offices, whose work would be reinforced by formal agency-level planning requirements. GAO, whose existing frameworks would be formally incorporated into federal policy.
Who is hurt
Federal agencies, which would bear administrative costs of developing, maintaining, and resubmitting plans on a recurring cycle. OMB staff, who would take on new guidance-writing and annual reporting responsibilities. Smaller or under-resourced agencies may face disproportionate compliance burdens relative to their emergency spending footprint. Fraudulent claimants would face greater detection risk, though this is an intended effect. Emergency aid applicants broadly may experience slower or more complex disbursement processes if pre-expenditure controls add friction to the application process.
Supporters argue
Supporters argue that federal emergency spending has a well-documented fraud problem: the GAO estimated that COVID-19 relief programs alone saw improper payments and fraud potentially exceeding $100 billion, and disaster relief programs have faced similar vulnerabilities for decades. They contend that requiring agencies to adopt proactive, pre-expenditure fraud controls — rather than reactive audits after money is lost — is a fiscally responsible approach that protects the integrity of programs that millions of Americans depend on in their most vulnerable moments.
Opponents argue
Opponents argue that adding mandatory planning layers to emergency spending programs risks slowing disbursement precisely when speed is critical — during disasters or pandemics, delayed payments can cause direct harm to affected populations. They contend that agencies already operate under existing fraud prevention frameworks from GAO and OMB, and that this bill largely duplicates oversight infrastructure already in place, creating bureaucratic overhead without meaningfully reducing fraud beyond what current law already requires.
Constitutional context
The Appropriations Clause (Art. I, §9, cl. 7) gives Congress authority to set conditions on how federal funds are spent, and this bill exercises that authority by requiring agencies to implement fraud controls on emergency appropriations. No active constitutional tension is implicated — this is a standard exercise of congressional oversight and spending power.
Checks and balances
Congress gains enhanced oversight authority through annual OMB reporting on agency fraud-prevention plans; OMB gains new administrative authority over agencies, checked by the requirement to report plans and legislative recommendations directly to Congress.
Historical precedent
The Improper Payments Information Act of 2002 and its successors (IPERA 2010, PIIA 2019) established earlier federal frameworks for identifying and reducing improper payments across federal programs, representing directly analogous prior congressional action in this space.
Passed