National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022

Floor Speech

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Mr. LYNCH. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of en bloc amendments #2 and #3 which include three of my amendments that will improve transparency in our overseas contingency contracts, make our sanctions regimes more effective, and strengthen our ability to combat illicit financing networks.

My first amendment, #252, reauthorizes the Commission on Wartime Contracting which will engage in vital oversight of our contracting and reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq and other areas where we conduct contingency operations.

This Commission has a proven track record of helping us reduce waste and fraud in overseas operations contracting. Indeed, in its prior iteration, from 2008 to 2011, the Commission found between $31 billion and $60 billion in U.S. taxpayer funds that were lost due to contract waste, fraud, and abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now that the U.S. has withdrawn from Afghanistan after 20 years, and as we prepare to end our combat mission in Iraq by the end of this year--after 19 years of war--it would be irresponsible not to examine what came of the hundreds of billions in contract dollars spent during these operations.

Amendment #253 comprises the language of two vital bills. The first is the Combating Illicit Finance Through Public-Private Partnerships Act, which would expand the mandate of the interagency supervisory team convened by the Department of the Treasury to examine strategies to improve public-private partnerships to counter illicit finance by including sanctions evasion and other illicit financial activities. The amendment also contains the provisions of the Strengthening Awareness of Sanctions Act, which would establish within the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) a voluntary public-private information sharing partnership among law enforcement agencies, national security agencies, financial institutions, and OFAC, which will allow for a more effective administration and enforcement to better administer and enforce economic and trade sanctions.

This illicit finance amendment will ensure that the sanctions we impose are able to successfully cut off the funding that allow bad actors to continue to carry out terror attacks, traffic in drugs, humans, and weapons, pose threats to the U.S. and our allies, and cause instability around the world.

Finally, amendment #254 directs the President to re-establish the Afghanistan Threat Finance Cell. This interagency effort would bring together law enforcement, military, and financial intelligence resources to identify, target, disrupt, and dismantle illicit financial networks.

Like the Commission on Wartime Contracting, the Afghanistan Threat Finance Cell has also proven itself as an effective body: not long after its establishment in 2008, it was the first organization to reveal an interdependent web of links between corrupt Afghan officials, criminals, drug traffickers, and insurgents. Thanks to the efforts of the Threat Finance Cell, the Executive Branch took action to pursue broad efforts to address and combat Afghan corruption.

While the Afghanistan Threat Finance Cell ended in 2014, this effort remains just as important, especially now that the U.S. no longer has an in-country military presence. The renewed Cell will serve a critical role in tracking and disrupting the use of threat finance by insurgent groups and other illicit actors, while augmenting the oversight work of regional financial investigative units. Only by eliminating the sources of funding can we effectively take on the terrorists, drug traffickers, and other criminal elements that continue to feed into the corruption and instability in Afghanistan.

Inclusion of these amendments will strengthen congressional oversight and government transparency, as well as bolster the effectiveness of our sanctions, and provide vital tools with which to combat fraud, waste, and corruption.

I would like to thank Chairman Smith and Ranking Member Rogers for including these three amendments in the two en bloc amendments. I would urge all Members to support the passage of these en blocs.

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