U.S. Department of Energy Inspector General Teri Donaldson recently cautioned the Biden White House about possible conflicts of interest, the risk to taxpayers, and the potential for awards to be granted to foreign entities.

Donaldson has called on the Biden administration to suspend its $400 billion green energy loan program, citing substantial financial risks and insufficient oversight.

The inspector general of the U.S. Department of Energy urged the agency’s loan office to immediately halt issuing billions of dollars in loans to green projects, saying contractors who vet them may be serving both the agency and potential borrowers.

The watchdog in an interim report, opens new tab issued late on Tuesday urged the DOE’s Loan Programs Office to stop the financing until it can ensure that contracting officers and their representatives are “complying with conflicts of interest regulations and enforcing conflict of interest contractual obligations.”

The Inspector General’s evaluation in October presented a troubling outlook regarding the absence of oversight and  inadequate risk management.

Donaldson — whose remarks were delivered during testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Thursday — said the current structure of the Department of Energy’s massive loan program brings “tremendous risk to the taxpayers.” She further warned that there is substantial risk federal green energy awards will be made to entities with foreign entanglements that may go undetected.

“You have massive amounts of money moving quickly,” Donaldson said. “All of these things happening at once create a level of risk that may, candidly, be unprecedented in terms of amounts of federal money moving in such a complicated landscape.”

“On the issue of not funding our adversaries, I am greatly concerned about how things are going in that regard,” she added. “The department has set up a vetting center, which is a step in the right direction. But it is now six months old, it has three employees, it has no written procedures. There is no clear path on what projects will be vetted, what the criteria will be used when they are vetted. It has a very, very long way to go, and that’s of huge concern to me.”

Donaldson’s harsh evaluation of the Biden administration’s green energy efforts closely followed a similarly critical report by Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) and Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), titled “Irresponsible, Reckless, Alarming: IRA Will Make the United States Poorer and China Richer.”

With all of the controversy surrounding a spending bill being floated in the House of Representatives, it would be a good idea for Republicans to argue that shutting down the government to stop all Biden-era spending is essential, especially if the current budget deal is heading in that direction. The U.S. should not enrich China while, simultaneously, bankrupting itself.

At least there is one government official in Washington, D.C., that is seemingly seeking to serve the American public over advancing a political agenda.