The Department of War Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a report on the Biden administration-era telework policies Tuesday that revealed that at least $665,000 was spent — questionably — on locality pay.
The report is the first from the War Department since Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa sent a letter to 24 government agencies requesting a review of the issues involved with telecommuting in August 2023, with some agencies refusing to send data during the Biden administration. Ernst told the Daily Caller News Foundation the report confirmed many of her suspicions when she initially began looking into the telework policies. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Post Office Admits It Has Little Clue How To Deal With Hundreds Of Vacant Buildings)
“From bubble baths to the beach and beyond, I’ve been warning that Biden’s bureaucrats were everywhere except the office,” Ernst said. “Thanks to my oversight and partnership with the Trump administration, the days of federal workers missing in action at the expense of hardworking taxpayers is coming to an end. Showing up is half the battle, and Biden’s bureaucrats were in full retreat. If the Pentagon can’t keep track of its personnel or our tax dollars, no wonder it can’t pass a clean audit.”
U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth speaks to senior military leaders at Marine Corps Base Quantico on September 30, 2025 in Quantico, Virginia. In an unprecedented gathering, almost 800 generals, admirals and their senior enlisted leaders have been ordered into one location from around the world on short notice. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
The War Department was unable to reliably determine how many employees were teleworking, largely due to a lack of proper recordkeeping, individual agencies within the Department of War developing their own policies and employees using the wrong timesheets to document remote work, according to the OIG report.
Ernst detailed the issues that telework created involving locality pay, an adjustment to the basic pay of civilian employees in the federal government intended to make sure that federal employees have comparable compensation to private-sector counterparts in a given area of the country, in a December 2024 report. Ernst provided the report to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who headed the Department of Government Efficiency in the early months of President Donald Trump’s second term.
According to the OIG report, in one case, a War Department employee received incorrect locality pay for four years.
“One employee’s duty location was incorrectly changed back in 2020,” the report said. “After we requested supporting documentation for this employee, DCSA HR personnel noted that this was an error. Although they stated that they were in the process of correcting the pay, the DCSA paid the incorrect amount for at least four years.”
The report also said it was very possible that additional funds were paid out improperly. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Federal Gov’t’s Telework Obsession Is Way Worse Than You Thought)
Americans are tired of “learing” about billions in fraud AFTER it happens.
The Senate DOGE Caucus is taking action to stop fraud BEFORE it happens! pic.twitter.com/E884WqCmIf
— Joni Ernst (@SenJoniErnst) January 20, 2026
“In addition, our review only included people that were coding the work hours in their timesheets as Telework Remote for the entire pay period,” the report said. “If a remote work employee was not using the proper Remote Work timesheet code in their timesheet or took leave during the pay period, they were not included in our review. Consequently, the number of employees receiving the incorrect locality pay could potentially be much greater.”
When she launched the investigation in August 2023, Ernst cited a media account of a VA employee who attended a staff meeting while taking a bubble bath and a case involving an employee with the United States Patent and Trademark Office who received $25,000 while spending over 730 hours at the golf course or happy hours.
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