Democrats made fun of Ben Carson for not being fit to lead a major federal agency.

He’s just a neurosurgeon, they said… he has no managerial experience.

Well, this managerial neophyte has just uncovered $500 billion (yes, billion) in errors during an internal audit of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

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President Donald Trump picked Dr. Carson to head the massive agency – which only got bigger under President Barack Obama.

As one of his first actions, Carson ordered a top-to-bottom audit of the agency. They identified $516.4 billion in errors from 2016 alone. In addition, the audit identified 11 material weaknesses, seven “significant deficiencies” and five instances where the agency failed to comply with federal law.

From the report:

There were several other unresolved audit matters, which restricted our ability to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to express an opinion. These unresolved audit matters relate to (1) the Office of General Counsel’s refusal to sign the management representation letter, (2) HUD’s improper use of cumulative and first-in, first-out budgetary accounting methods of disbursing community planning and development program funds, (3) the $4.2 billion in nonpooled loan assets from Ginnie Mae’s stand-alone financial statements that we could not audit due to inadequate support, (4) the improper accounting for certain HUD assets and liabilities, and (5) material differences between HUD’s subledger and general ledger accounts. This audit report contains 11 material weaknesses, 7 significant deficiencies, and 5 instances of noncompliance with applicable laws and regulations.

Amazingly, the audit found that these same problems were reported for three straight years by the Inspector General, but the previous administration never did anything about it.

The continued problems “were due to an inability to establish a compliant control environment, implement adequate financial accounting systems, retain key financial staff, and identify appropriate accounting principles and policies,” the IG said.

The unresolved issues — the same ones the IG highlighted in its December report — include HUD lawyers’ refusals to sign a management letter listing all HUD litigation, HUD’s improper accounting methods, failure to correctly measure assets and liabilities, discrepancies between general ledger and sub-ledger accounts, and $4.2 billion in loan assets from Ginnie Mae’s financial statements that lack sufficient support for an audit.

Brian Sullivan, HUD’s spokesman, told The Daily Caller News Foundation’s Investigative Group in December 2016 that, “HUD does apply generally accepted accounting standards,” when the IG said the department does not.

H/T: Daily Wire



