Media Mentions – Functional Government Initiative

Democrat Rep. Matt Cartwright Won’t Say if He’s Using Taxpayer Funds to Park His Private Plane

By Jordan Dixon-Hamilton (Breitbart)

September 12, 2022

Democrat Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-PA) is suspiciously silent after reports came to light that he used taxpayer funds to pay the monthly parking fees for his private plane.

Cartwright, who is worth up to $10.9 million, pays $425 every month to the Delaware River and Bay Authority, which operates the New Castle Airport in Delaware. As the Washington Free Beacon reported, that monthly price matches the airport’s advertised “small hangar” monthly storage price.

The monthly payments to the Delaware River and Bay Authority were marked on Cartwright’s financial disclosures as “Taxi/Parking/Tolls” and “District Office Parking,” despite the airport being outside his congressional district.

Democrat Matt Cartwright Has Potential Conflict of Interest with General Electric, Ethics Watchdog Says

By Nick Gilbertson and Jacob Bliss (Breitbart)

September 6, 2022

An ethics watchdog group says Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-PA) is involved in a potential conflict of interest after visiting General Electric’s (GE) Research facility in upstate New York last month and holds up to $15,000 in GE stock, according to financial disclosures.

Cartwright and Rep. Paul Tonko (D-NY) went to GE Research in Niskayuna, New York, on August 17, where they toured the facility, the Schenectady-based Daily Gazette’s John Cropley reported.

The reporter noted that the two congressmen left the research facility impressed by the “work being done in areas such as hybrid-electric aircraft propulsion and hydrogen-fueled engines,” bringing Cartwright to say, “There’s going to be a revolution in the way people get around in the air over the next 10 or 15 years and you’re going to see that revolution right here in Schenectady,” referring to the GE Research facility.

Dem May Have ‘Violated’ House Rules After Appearing In TV Ads, Watchdog Alleges

By Gabe Kaminsky (The Daily Caller)

August 31, 2022

Democratic Pennsylvania Rep. Matt Cartwright may have “violated” congressional rules for appearing in the TV ads of a top donor’s law firm, a watchdog alleged in a complaint obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Cartwright praised law firm Parker Waichman and its partner Jerry Parker in July TV ads that have since been pulled by the firm, Axios reported Thursday. Cartwright’s appearance in the ads may violate ethics rules because he gave his “endorsement” of Parker and used House resources to “support” the firm, watchdog Functional Government Initiative (FGI) wrote in a complaint Monday to the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE).

‘Wholly Inadequate’: Federal Agencies Have No System To Check Whether Remote Employees Are Actually Working

By Patrick Hauf (Washington Free Beacon)

August 27, 2022

Several federal agencies have no system in place to monitor whether remote workers are actually clocking in for the job—a fact one Republican senator said is “unacceptable and baffling” as the Biden administration pushes to expand telework options for its growing number of federal workers.

Four federal agencies told the Washington Free Beacon they have no specific oversight of remote employees: the Department of the Interior, Department of Defense, Department of Veterans Affairs, and Department of Housing and Urban Development. The agencies said their usual productivity measurements are adequate to track employees who shifted to remote work at the start of the pandemic. Sen. Richard Burr (R., N.C.) received a similar response from the Department of Labor when he asked about the agency’s telework policies—and said this justification is “wholly inadequate and non-responsive.”

Ethics Scandal Ensnares Democrat Rep. Matt Cartwright, Top Donor

By Jacob Bliss (Breitbart)

August 25, 2022

Democrat Rep. Matt Cartwright (PA) appears to be involved in an ethics scandal after he was seen in a commercial praising his top donor’s law firm after he was filmed talking about his newly passed bill about water contamination at Camp Lejeune, according to Axios.

As members of Congress are forbidden to use official taxpayer-funded resources to promote themselves in a commercial or for campaign purposes, Cartwright was seen in the video clip praising the multi-million dollar law firm Parker Waichman and a partner, Jerry Parker, for their representation of U.S. servicemen and family members affected by water contamination at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, Axios explained.

Watchdog Sues Biden Administration Over Refusal to Provide Studies on Masks

By Zachary Stieber (The Epoch Times)

August 16, 2022

A watchdog group is suing the Biden administration for allegedly refusing to provide information on studies on the efficacy of cloth masks. Functional Government Initiative (FGI) says the Department of Health and Human Services and two subagencies have violated federal law by refusing to provide the information.

FGI in February sent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to the department, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases seeking details on how the agencies have analyzed the effectiveness of cloth masks, including information on any studies the agencies have funded on the matter.

Biden Admin Hit With Lawsuit For Allegedly Hiding Records On ‘Hostile Takeover’ Of Key Regulator

By Gabe Kaminsky (Daily Caller)

July 14, 2022

A government watchdog is suing a federal agency responsible for regulating consumer finance over its alleged stonewalling of records on its “hostile takeover” of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), according to a complaint obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Functional Government Initiative (FGI), a group probing abuse in government, filed a Freedom of Information Act request in January for records related to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) “unprecedented moves” undermining the FDIC’s independence. The watchdog says it has received no records even though the CFPB promised it would produce them by June 2, and is now suing for the records.

Rohit Chopra, the CFPB’s director who sits on the FDIC board, came under scrutiny after trying to launch a joint public comment on bank merger reforms in December 2021 without the approval of then-FDIC Chair Jelena McWilliams. Chopra bypassed “long-established processes” by serving the chair with a “finished document requesting public comment” in a “brazen attempt to seize control,” McWilliams, a Trump appointee who announced her resignation in February, wrote in a December op-ed in The Wall Street Journal.

Watchdog Sues Biden Admin For Stonewalling Records On Emergency Oil Release

By Gabe Kaminsky (Daily Caller)

July 8, 2022

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is being sued by a federal watchdog for failing to release documents related to the Biden administration’s decision to tap into emergency oil reserves amid global supply shortages.

President Joe Biden’s DOE is “wrongfully withholding” information on its deployment of millions of oil barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the Functional Government Initiative (FGI), a nonprofit transparency group, alleged in a complaint filed last Monday. The watchdog filed a Freedom of Information Act request in January 2022 for records dating back one year with the keywords “Biden poll numbers,” “oil supply imbalance,” “inflation” and others.

“Rising gas prices that are a direct result of the administration’s failed energy policy is not an emergency,” FGI spokesman Pete McGinnis told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Every time we release oil from the SPR, or sell it to China for that matter, we put our national security at risk by unnecessarily depleting our emergency oil reserves. Americans deserve to know if the motive behind these initial releases were political.”

Nearly 22,000 DHS Employees Seek COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate Exemptions

By Zachary Stieber (The Epoch Times)

July 6, 2022

Nearly 22,000 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employees have sought exemptions to the U.S. government’s federal COVID-19 vaccine mandate, but the requests all remain in limbo, according to newly obtained documents.

Key agencies within DHS could face a massive loss of workers if the requests aren’t resolved, a watchdog warns.

More than 8,100 Customs and Border Protection employees, who include Border Patrol agents, have asked for a medical or religious exemption to the mandate that was imposed by President Joe Biden in 2021. In addition, over 5,800 Transportation Security Administration workers have requested accommodations, while more than 2,800 Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees have sought exemptions on religious or medical grounds.

Democratic Rep Cast Most Of His Votes By ‘Proxy’ While Spending Tens Of Thousands On Travel And Events

By Gabe Kaminsky (Daily Caller)

June 30, 2022

Democratic Illinois Rep. Bobby Rush has overwhelmingly voted by “proxy” since the practice was first authorized in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, however, Rush has spent thousands in travel and event expenses on the dime of taxpayers and donors, including on days he voted by proxy, Federal Election Commission (FEC) and House disbursement records show…

“Proxy voting was initially introduced during the COVID crisis to protect at-risk members during the public health emergency,” Pete McGinnis, spokesman for the Functional Government Initiative, told TheDCNF. “Unfortunately, we have seen proxy voting not only continue to be used in the 117th Congress, it’s use is increasing. We believe this removes a critical part of the debate process that was intended by our founding fathers.”