Comer, Sessions Examine Role of Taxpayer-Funded “Volunteer” Services in Biden Admin’s Radical Green New Deal Climate Corps

WASHINGTON—House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) and Subcommittee on Government Operations and the Federal Workforce Chairman Pete Sessions (R-Texas) today sent a letter seeking more information related to the Biden Administration’s recently announced American Climate Corps (ACC). In a letter to the CEO of AmeriCorps, a federal agency for national service and volunteerism, the lawmakers request documents and information to better understand AmeriCorps’ role in facilitating the ACC, including anticipated costs and the extent to which funds will be redirected from existing federal agencies and programs to the ACC.

“The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is conducting oversight over the American Climate Corps (ACC), a ‘workforce and service initiative’ recently announced by the Biden Administration. According to the Administration’s announcement, this initiative would purportedly enlist more than 20,000 young people to work green energy jobs which ‘will focus on equity and environmental justice.’ […] According to the announcement, as the nexus of the ACC for federal agencies, AmeriCorps seems poised to facilitate the flow of an unspecified sum of federal taxpayer dollars to unknown individuals and entities. It is unclear where these funds are coming from and for what purposes they will be used,” the lawmakers wrote.

As part of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability’s efforts to combat waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government and to safeguard taxpayer dollars, the Committee is conducting oversight of the Biden Administration’s climate agenda and its impacts on American agencies, businesses, and workers.

“AmeriCorps is a federal agency devoted to national service and fostering volunteerism. This includes ‘providing people power and funding’ to eligible organizations, raising questions about identity and goals of the parties who may be applying to AmeriCorps for taxpayer funds to facilitate the ACC program. […] It is therefore important to understand exactly which jobs applicants would fill, how they would be selected, and for what purposes,” the lawmakers continued.

Read the letter to AmeriCorps CEO Michael D. Smith here.