The government’s own paper trail grew considerably last week. Between August 17 and August 21, the Government Accountability Office published audits reaching from nuclear fuel programs to service members’ brain health, the Justice Department’s inspector general posted a contract audit and a misconduct summary, the Education Department’s watchdog documented a stalled audit-closure process, and Illinois’ Auditor General released a set of compliance examinations and a performance audit of state innovation spending. Each item below links directly to the underlying public record so readers can verify every claim against the source document. As always, what follows reflects what the records themselves state — not independent findings by The Investigative Journal.
Federal Audits
GAO: $140 billion in long-term uranium enrichment costs not yet reported to Congress
The week’s most consequential number appears in a GAO report released August 20 on federal uranium supply efforts. According to the report, the National Nuclear Security Administration is pursuing three long-term enrichment efforts to meet national security needs and estimates total program costs of about $140 billion through 2105. GAO found that NNSA “has not yet conveyed those costs in a biennial report required by Congress” because the estimates are new — meaning lawmakers charged with funding the programs have not yet received the price tag through the reporting channel Congress itself established.
The report also examined the civilian side of the fuel supply. Records indicate the Department of Energy awarded $900 million to one company to expand low-enriched uranium production and issued $1.8 billion in awards to two companies to build capacity for high-assay low-enriched uranium, the fuel needed by advanced reactors. GAO found that DOE “did not document an analysis to determine whether its actions are sufficient to induce expansion” of commercial production in the United States — a notable gap given the ban on low-enriched uranium imports from Russia that the report cites as a factor affecting availability.
GAO made five recommendations, including that NNSA report the long-term costs in the required biennial plan and that DOE conduct economic analyses consistent with best practices. Both agencies outlined actions they plan to take in response, according to the report. The full 83-page report (PDF) is available from GAO.
GAO: DOD’s brain-health monitoring is underway but under-resourced
A GAO report released August 18 examined the Pentagon’s response to growing evidence that blast overpressure from firing certain weapons may affect service members’ brain health, with symptoms that can include headaches, memory loss, and traumatic brain injury. According to the report, DOD established requirements in 2024 for baseline cognitive assessments — with all high-risk active-duty service members to complete one in fiscal year 2025 — and for tracking individual exposures to blast overpressure.
The audit found implementation is straining against resources. DOD component officials told GAO that insufficient staff and technology hindered the cognitive assessments, and that a shortage of industrial hygiene personnel is slowing exposure tracking. Per the report, DOD moved quickly to stand the programs up but “there was not an opportunity to fully evaluate” whether the necessary resources were allocated, as DOD’s own policy requires. A one-year pilot of a new assessment tool was slated to begin in summer 2026, but GAO noted DOD had no documented plan to evaluate it.
GAO made two recommendations for comprehensive resource assessments; DOD agreed with both, according to the report. The stakes are practical: the exposure records being created today become the service records that veterans will rely on when seeking care and benefits years from now. The full report (PDF) runs 62 pages.
GAO: Ex-Im Bank financed no new dual-use exports in FY 2025
In its annual statutory review released August 21, GAO reported that the Export-Import Bank financed no new exports under its dual-use authority — which covers defense articles with both military and civilian applications — in fiscal year 2025. As of August 2026, the report states, the bank was not monitoring the end use of any dual-use export because all prior transactions had been repaid in full.
The review, required by Congress since 1994, is brief at seven pages, but it is the public record that the bank’s dual-use portfolio is currently dormant — a baseline worth having on file if that posture changes. The report (PDF) is available from GAO.
Also out of GAO last week: an August 21 report finding that better information on risks and challenges is needed to improve oversight of DOD facility conditions, and an August 20 report concluding the Army needs better schedule and cost information to support scaling its battlefield network.
Inspector General Findings
DOJ OIG audits DEA diversion-control contract task orders
On August 20, the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General released an audit of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s diversion control support task orders awarded to Ocean Bay Information and Systems Management, LLC. The diversion control mission — DEA’s regulation of the lawful pharmaceutical supply chain — depends heavily on contractor support, which makes contract administration in this area a recurring oversight subject.
The audit, report number 26-080, carries 11 recommendations, a count that suggests auditors identified multiple areas for corrective action in how the task orders were managed. The specific findings, along with responses gathered during the audit process, are laid out in the full report (PDF). TIJ has not independently characterized the findings beyond what the public record states.
DOJ OIG: misconduct findings against a former FBI Special Agent in Charge
A day earlier, on August 19, the same office posted an investigative summary finding misconduct by a then-FBI Special Agent in Charge for violating Department of Justice and FBI policies on the acceptance of gifts, and FBI policies on the use and handling of firearms. The individual is not named in the posting, consistent with OIG practice for administrative misconduct summaries.
Investigative summaries of this kind are the principal public record of administrative findings against senior law enforcement officials, and they merit routine attention: gift-acceptance rules exist to protect investigative independence, and firearms-handling policies exist for obvious reasons. The summary (PDF), report number 26-081, describes the findings.
Education Department’s audit follow-up left without an owner, IG reports
An inspection report issued August 17 by the Education Department’s Office of Inspector General examined whether the department ensures that agreed-upon corrective actions from external audits actually get taken. The review covered October 2019 through September 2024 and found the follow-up process “generally effective” for that period, with generally complete documentation and improved, if inconsistent, timeliness.
The more striking findings concern the present. According to the report, “it is unclear which Department office, if any, now oversees external audit follow-up and closure activities,” because the office previously responsible was effectively eliminated during the department’s workforce restructuring in early 2025. The IG noted that no external OIG audits have been closed since January 2025, even though several appear ready for closure. The report also states the department “did not provide all requested information or permit unfettered access to Department staff,” which limited the review.
The OIG made three recommendations to the department’s Chief Financial Officer. An audit-recommendation pipeline with no owner is how documented problems quietly go unfixed, which makes this a record worth revisiting in six months. The full report (PDF) is available from the OIG.
State Records
Illinois: performance audit of state money for the Discovery Partners Institute
The Illinois Auditor General on August 18 released a performance audit (PDF) of state monies provided to the Discovery Partners Institute and the Illinois Innovation Network, the University of Illinois-affiliated innovation initiative. State-funded innovation and economic-development ventures are a category where public money often meets limited public scrutiny, and a performance audit is the primary accountability record available to taxpayers.
A summary digest (PDF) accompanies the full report. The same day, the office released its FY 2025 compliance examination (PDF) of the Department of Healthcare and Family Services, the agency that administers Illinois’ Medicaid program.
Illinois: unemployment-insurance oversight, revisited
On August 20, the Illinois Auditor General published the FY 2025 compliance examination (PDF) of the Illinois Department of Employment Security along with a follow-up report (PDF) on a prior performance audit of the state’s unemployment insurance programs.
Follow-up reports are among the most useful documents state auditors produce: they show whether an agency implemented the recommendations it accepted, or let them lapse once attention moved on. Given the scale of unemployment-system stresses documented nationwide in recent years, the implementation record here deserves a close read.
FOIA and Document Releases
National Security Archive posts records on EPA’s greenhouse gas reporting program
On August 18, the National Security Archive at George Washington University published a briefing book from its Climate Change Transparency Project titled “Inside the Struggle to Dismantle America’s Greenhouse Gas Data,” compiling records concerning the future of EPA’s greenhouse gas reporting program and federal methane reporting requirements.
The Archive characterizes the documents as tracing industry efforts to roll back federal methane regulations; readers should note that framing belongs to the Archive, and the underlying records — obtained through public-records channels — are posted for independent review. Whatever one’s view of the reporting requirements at issue, the documents are a primary source on how regulated industries and regulators negotiate what data the government collects, and they are now part of the public record.
What Warrants a Deeper Look
Several of this week’s records point toward follow-up work TIJ intends to pursue. First, the NNSA cost disclosure: a $140 billion estimate that has not yet reached Congress through its required reporting channel invites a simple test — whether the next biennial Enriched Uranium Management Plan includes it. We will be watching, and requesting the underlying cost documentation. Second, the Education Department’s audit-closure standstill: records suggest no external OIG audits have been closed since January 2025, and it is unclear which office now owns the function. Organizational charts and delegations of authority since the early-2025 restructuring are obtainable records that would answer the question the IG could not. Third, the DEA task-order audit: eleven recommendations on a single contractor relationship is a signal worth tracing through the federal procurement database to the underlying contract files. Finally, the Illinois Discovery Partners Institute audit belongs to a national pattern — state-funded innovation ventures with ambitious promises and thin public reporting — that lends itself to comparison across states.
Editorial note: Every factual claim above is drawn from, and linked to, a primary public record. Statements attributed to reports reflect the contents of those documents, not independent TIJ findings. Where audited agencies provided responses, those responses appear within the linked reports; TIJ will publish any response from entities named in this roundup. Correction requests: contact the editor.