A Bill to Abolish Watchdog Group Is Making Its Way Through Congress

Shortly before Congress left for its August recess, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform approved a bill that would abolish the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE). CIGIE is the independent agency responsible for coordinating, training, and setting quality standards for federal inspectors general. The bill, the Restoring Integrity and Efficiency to Inspector General Oversight Act, would transfer CIGIE’s responsibilities to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), an agency housed within the White House. It has not yet been scheduled for consideration by the full House of Representatives.

CIGIE supports the work of more than 70 Offices of Inspectors General (OIG), the nonpartisan watchdogs responsible for rooting out waste, fraud, abuse, and misconduct in the executive branch. CIGIE provides OIGs with training, coordinates their work across agencies, establishes quality standards, and manages peer reviews and websites like oversight.gov, the online public archive of OIG reports. By abolishing CIGIE and transferring OIG oversight to the White House, the bill would make it easier for the Trump administration to shield itself from scrutiny and would put the government’s central accountability mechanisms at further risk of political interference.

OMB does not have the expertise to do CIGIE’s work

CIGIE currently coordinates specialized training for attorneys, auditors, evaluators, and investigators, including law enforcement officers. To do this, CIGIE brings in experts in the inspector general community to ensure that training meets the needs of the relevant disciplines. Shifting the responsibility for these trainings to OMB could have serious ramifications: OIGs need to be properly and consistently trained to ensure their objectivity, effectiveness, and professionalism. OMB lacks expertise in most inspector general responsibilities, including law enforcement.

CIGIE also provides Congress with recommendations and technical assistance for legislation, to address priorities of OIGs. Recommendations from CIGIE provided the basis for key amendments to the Inspector General Independence and Empowerment Act, enacted by Congress in 2022 to strengthen access to information and the independence of inspectors general. One of the changes, for example, requires that any individual the president designates as an acting inspector general must have significant experience in the field — either as an inspector general or a senior staff person in an inspector general’s office — to ensure that people nominated for the position are equipped to do it.

OMB is at higher risk for interference that would undermine work of inspectors general

Inspectors general are responsible for independently investigating allegations of government fraud, waste, abuse, or mismanagement. OMB is within the White House, so putting the agency in charge of coordinating inspectors general would open the watchdogs to direct interference by the White House. Given President Trump’s track record of attacking and dismantling independent oversight mechanisms, that is a significant risk. During the first week of his second term, Trump removed at least 17 inspectors general from nearly every cabinet-level agency. He later removed others in retaliation for their oversight of his administration’s actions. Some of the removed inspectors general have been replaced with nominees whose backgrounds raise concerns about their independence.

CIGIE also sounds the alarm to Congress when threats to the independence of inspectors general arise. In 2019, CIGIE sent a letter to the then-attorney general when the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel issued a memo that interfered with the inspector general of the intelligence community’s determination that a whistleblower complaint alleging foreign election interference was an urgent concern that should be provided to Congress. Then, in January 2025, CIGIE’s chair sent a letter to the director of presidential personnel after presidentially-appointed inspectors general were sent a series of emails informing them that they were being removed by President Trump. The letter outlined how the removals were legally insufficient, since the required 30-day notice and case-specific reason for each removal had not been provided to Congress. Representatives from CIGIE have also repeatedly testified to Congress regarding threats to independence, access to information, and other matters impacting inspector generals.

CIGIE and inspectors general are crucial for ensuring our government is accountable to the people. By abolishing CIGIE, Congress would endanger the independence and overall effectiveness of the OIG community.