This week, Gene Dodaro, the outgoing Comptroller General of the United States, delivered his final testimony to Congress. After 15 years leading the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Dodaro used his closing appearance to highlight persistent high-risk areas across the federal government that expose taxpayers to waste, fraud, and abuse. He also reiterated a warning GAO has issued consistently during his tenure: without sustained leadership and reform from lawmakers, the nation’s fiscal trajectory is becoming increasingly perilous.
High-Risk Programs and a Worsening Fiscal Outlook
The bulk of Dodaro’s testimony focused on GAO’s annual High-Risk List, which currently includes 38 areas where federal programs are vulnerable to waste and mismanagement or in need of fundamental reform. While the topics vary, the underlying theme is familiar: fragmented programs, weak oversight, outdated systems, and incentives that reward spending rather than results.
Among the most notable problem areas:
Federal disaster assistance, where overlapping programs spread across more than 30 agencies create confusion, duplication, and delayed aid—raising costs for taxpayers while failing to deliver timely help to communities.
Cybersecurity and IT modernization, where agencies continue to rely on aging legacy systems that are costly to maintain and increasingly vulnerable to breaches.
Improper payments, which still total tens of billions of dollars annually despite years of warnings, reporting requirements, and corrective action plans.
The U.S. Postal Service, which remains on GAO’s High-Risk List due to its unsustainable financial model, persistent operating losses, and long-term liabilities that continue to put taxpayers at risk absent meaningful structural reform.
GAO has repeatedly shown that implementing its recommendations can yield enormous returns for taxpayers, identifying hundreds of billions of dollars in potential savings through better program design, improved management, and more effective congressional oversight.
Reforms are increasingly urgent given the federal government’s fiscal trajectory, which was another prominent theme Dodaro emphasized in his testimony. He warned that debt held by the public, now at around $31 trillion, will rise to a high of 106% of GDP in 2027 and then grow twice as fast as the economy going forward, piling up an unsustainable debt burden for future generations.
What Comes Next for GAO
Dodaro’s term is coming to a close. He has served as Comptroller General since 2008, leading GAO through multiple administrations and fiscal crises. The position is structured to be independent, with the law providing for a single, nonrenewable 15-year term, with removal only for cause. That design has helped preserve GAO’s credibility as a nonpartisan watchdog focused on facts, not politics.
As Dodaro departs, he leaves behind an institution with a strong track record. Taxpayers owe him gratitude for consistently raising the fiscal alarm while providing lawmakers with practical, real-world recommendations that have produced meaningful savings.
GAO is one of Congress’s most important and most cost-effective oversight tools. It provides lawmakers with independent audits, evaluations, and recommendations that help identify wasteful spending, improve program performance, and hold agencies accountable.
Earlier this year, GAO itself became a target during budget negotiations, when proposals surfaced to cut funding for Congress’s own watchdog. As NTUF warned at the time, weakening GAO would have been a penny-wise, pound-foolish move that would reduce Congress’s capacity to oversee trillions of dollars in federal spending. Fortunately, lawmakers ultimately proceeded with an appropriations measure that preserved GAO’s funding levels for FY 2026.
Selecting the Next Comptroller General
In 2026, lawmakers have an opportunity to preserve and bolster GAO’s important role by choosing a well-qualified successor to Dodaro. National Taxpayers Union and the Project on Government Oversight recently outlined the statutory process Congress uses to identify, review, and nominate candidates for the position. This process has governed the selection of every Comptroller General to date.
GAO’s independence and its ability to call out waste and mismanagement regardless of which party is in power depend heavily on choosing a leader with the expertise, credibility, and independence to uphold its mission.
Conclusion
Comptroller General Gene Dodaro’s final testimony was as much fiscal warning as a farewell from his position. The federal government’s budgetary challenges are well-documented, and many of the solutions are already on the table. What taxpayers need now is sustained attention from Congress, backed by a strong, independent GAO, to turn recommendations into results.