In December, Brent Efron, a Biden appointee at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), told an undercover reporter from Project Veritas that “it truly feels like we’re on the Titanic and we’re throwing gold bars off the edge.” He admitted that EPA management was rushing to move billions of taxpayer dollars out the door before Inauguration Day, “before they [Trump appointees] come in and stop it all.” Efron saw these efforts as “an insurance policy against Trump winning.”
Asked where the “gold bars” were going, Efron replied, “Nonprofits, states, tribes, cities.”
You may recall that several days into his new job, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin made a startling announcement. In a reference to the Project Veritas video, he said his team had found some of the “gold bars.”
Shockingly, roughly 20 billion of your tax dollars were parked at an outside financial institution by the Biden EPA. This scheme was the first of its kind in EPA history and it was purposefully designed to obligate all of the money in a rushed job with reduced oversight. Even further, this pot of $20 billion was awarded to just eight entities that were then responsible for doling out your money to NGOs and others at their discretion, with far less transparency. Just under $7 billion was sent to one entity called the Climate United Fund….I will be referring this matter to the Inspector General’s office and will work with the Justice Department….The days of irresponsibly shoveling boatloads of cash to far-left activist groups in the name of environmental justice and climate equity are over….
Another entity, one that is linked to Stacey Abrams—who is best known for refusing to concede Georgia’s 2018 gubernatorial race—received $1.9 billion. This organization, called Power Forward Communities (PFC), had been in existence for a matter of months and showed revenue of $100 before receiving this massive grant.
HotAir‘s David Strom reported that PFC was “established in October 2023 as a coalition of groups led by Rewiring America, a left-wing group that advocates for electrification policies and a transition away from fossil fuel dependence.” Abrams serves as senior counsel for Rewiring America.
According to an August press release (the day the grant was officially awarded), PFC said the grant would “provide needed capital to transform the marketplace for heat pumps, heat pump water heaters, induction stoves, solar panels, home battery systems, EV chargers, and wiring and weatherization upgrades that support them.”
Zeldin appeared on Fox News’s Jesse Watters Primetime on Thursday night to discuss the situation. Watters asked Zeldin, “Is this a kickback? Is it theft? Is it graft?” Zeldin replied it was all of the above and proceeded to describe the very convoluted path these funds typically follow and how many “salaries” are paid along the way.
It’s a green slush fund. $20 billion parked at an outside bank towards the end of the Biden administration, given to just eight NGOs. … These NGOs were created for the first time, many of them, just to get this money. And they’re pass-throughs. So the EPA entered into this account control agreement with these entities. Treasury enters into a financial agent agreement with the bank, and they design it to tie the EPA’s hands behind their back — to tie the federal government’s hands behind its back.So when the money goes through the NGOs to subgrantees, many of them also pass-throughs, we don’t know where it’s going. We don’t have the proper amount of oversight. And, as you pointed out, it’s going to people in the Obama and Biden administrations, it’s going to donors. It’s not going directly … to remediate that environmental issue … deliver that clean air, land, and water….
Trump called out Abrams by name during his address to Congress on Tuesday night. He said, “$1.9 billion to recently created Decarbonization of Homes Committee headed up—and we know she’s involved. Just at the last moment, the money was passed over by a woman named Stacey Abrams. Have you ever heard of her?”
During a Thursday night interview with MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, Abrams explained how the funds were spent:
In 2023 and 2024, I led a program called Vitalizing DeSoto. We worked in a tiny town in South Georgia to demonstrate that by replacing energy-inefficient appliances with efficient appliances, you can lower your cost. In fact, we accomplished that. For 75% of the community, they got appliances that are lowering their bills right now. We had one woman who saw her electric bill cut in half—from $180 to $98. That’s what we delivered.
And based on that program, a coalition of organizations, famous organizations, came together and said to the EPA, ‘If we can do this here, we can do this for millions more Americans. Let us invest the money of American in lowering the cost for Americans.’
And the EPA said, ‘Okay, great.’
Some may believe her, but most remain skeptical. The greater concern, however, is that within the vast federal budget, $2 billion is a mere drop in the bucket. If PFC serves as a microcosm of how taxpayer dollars are spent across the government, the true scale of the problem is staggering.
If taxpayer dollars are handled anywhere near as carelessly as suggested by the advisor in the Project Veritas video, it signals a deeper issue of fiscal irresponsibility that should alarm every American.
Perhaps Americans already recognize this, which is why they overwhelmingly support the efforts of the Department of Government Efficiency. It’s also likely why the small percentage who benefit from unchecked government spending are fighting so fiercely to maintain the status quo.
Elizabeth writes commentary for The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation and a member of the Editorial Board at The Sixteenth Council, a London think tank. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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