U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert was selected this week to serve on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, saying she aims to advocate for taxpayers and hold the Biden administration accountable.
“I am excited to get to work defending the individual liberties of the people of Colorado’s Third District by holding the Biden administration accountable,” she said in a news release.
Issues Boebert plans to address on the Oversight Committee include: the fentanyl epidemic, U.S. border situation, origins of COVID-19, fraud stemming from COVID relief funds, the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, government collusion with Big Tech to censor Americans, and the Biden family.
Through her position on the Oversight Committee, Boebert hopes to advocate for taxpayers in Colorado by holding the Biden administration accountable.
“As an advocate for transparency and reform, I will pursue the truth, conduct effective oversight, and fight to root out waste, fraud, and abuse throughout the federal government,” she said in the release.
Boebert’s goals adhere to the original missions of the Oversight Committee. Under Chairman James Comer’s leadership, the committee will get back to its original purpose of advocating for taxpayers through investigation of the federal government, according to her release.
Issues being addressed that could potentially impact Southwest Colorado include higher energy prices and COVID relief fraud. From June 2021 to June 2022, prices for imported natural gas increased 165.5% in the United States, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, driving up gas prices for Americans. The Oversight Committee will investigate Biden’s actions that influenced the cost of gas and energy such as electricity, household heating and natural gas prices, all of which have increased in price, impacting all American households.
In terms of COVID relief funds, it is estimated that at least $560 billion was lost to waste, fraud, abuse and mismanagement, according to the Oversight Committee. Colorado received over $2.6 billion in COVID-19 relief funding.
In the news release, the committee said mismanagement of COVID-19 funds resulted, in part, from public schools that spent the money not on programs that would help bridge a gap in learning, but instead on uses such as electric school buses.
Both the prices of energy increasing and COVID-19 relief mismanagement impacted Coloradans directly, as working-class families suffered economically during and after the pandemic, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Boebert said she is “looking forward” to working on the Oversight Committee in “eliminating mismanagement,” part of her overall mission to hold the Biden administration accountable and advocate for Coloradans and correctly using their tax money to benefit them.
Sarah Mattalian is an intern for The Durango Herald and The Journal in Cortez and a student at American University in Washington, D.C. She can be reached at smattalian@durangoherald.com.
