The Senate Armed Services Committee told Energy Secretary Rick Perry to clean up waste and abuse on the defense side of the department in a hearing Thursday, the first time an energy chief has visited the committee in more than a decade.
“A hearing like this is rare,” said Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the acting chairman for the committee. “Our committee has not called a secretary of energy to testify in over 10 years. You ought to feel good about that,” Inhofe said, trying to be friendly before laying into the criticisms of the agency Perry has overseen for a little over a year.
“I’m trying, sir,” Perry responded.
“The DOE’s defense programs, including the cleanup of nuclear waste, have gone without sufficient oversight,” Inhofe said, before reading a thorough critique by committee Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz., who is at home in Arizona being treated for brain cancer.
“Unfortunately, the DOE has run up a long list of cost overruns, schedule delays, and violations of safety and security,” McCain wrote. “Put simply, they have all too often failed to meet mission requirements” with the billions of dollars the agency receives annually under the National Defense Authorization Act.
McCain said the Armed Services Committee will begin the oversight necessary to help the agency “correct course.”
The Energy Department houses the National Nuclear Security Administration, which maintains the nation’s nuclear weapons arsenal. It also oversees several legacy weapons facilities that require clean up and decommissioning.
President Trump’s fiscal 2019 budget request seeks to increase funding for the agency in pursuit of development of new nuclear weapons. McCain noted that the fiscal 2019 request for NNSA and environment programs totals $20 billion, or 70 percent of the entire Energy Department’s budget.
Perry said he welcomed McCain’s oversight, saying the administration is focused on modernizing the arsenal while being committed to cleaning up the Savannah River and Hanford facilities. One of the first crises on Perry’s watch was a potential leakage incident at the Hanford site in Washington state.
