Senator Clinton on Report that Flawed Work by Government Contractors Resulted in the Deaths and Injuries of Military Personnel

May 6, 2008 -- WASHINGTON, DC — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton issued the following statement on a recent report that substandard maintenance work performed by a government contractor in Iraq may have led to deaths of several of our troops stationed there and the severe injuries of many more:

“These deaths and injuries are completely unacceptable and could have been avoided. We owe it to our brave men and women in uniform risking their lives in combat to ensure that they are not placed in harm’s way by unaccountable and unscrupulous contractors hired to by the Department of Defense. We need to not only get to the bottom of how this tragedy happened, but also enact comprehensive reforms to the private contracting system that is rife with waste, fraud and abuse that allowed this to happen.”

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A recent report has revealed that KBR, a former subsidiary of Halliburton, performed electrical work that resulted in the electrocution of at least a dozen military personnel and severe shocking many others. Disturbingly, it has been reported that warnings about the hazards associated with the work of the contractor were repeatedly ignored. KBR received a $30 billion contract from the Department of Defense (DOD) for reconstruction efforts in Iraq, including electrical repairs and upgrades of buildings. According to the report, KBR employees warned company managers and DOD officials that the work was being performed by unqualified workers.

Senator Clinton has been an aggressive critic of abuses in government contracting. Last month she introduced legislation that would prevent contactors that violated criminal laws from obtaining federal contracts. Additionally, she wrote to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget calling on the administration to move quickly to close loopholes in proposed rules that would allow federal contractors to hide criminal fraud, waste and abuse. She secured into law two measures to curtail wasteful and unnecessary practices including those that have resulted in the outsourcing of critical national security jobs to private firms and rewarded underperforming private contractors. One measure stopped DHS’s plan to downsize the Federal Protective Service, which is charged with protecting 9,000 non-military Federal buildings. The other provision barred DHS from giving award fees or bonuses to private contractors that do not meet the stipulations related to cost, schedule, and performance outlined in the contract. Additionally, Senator Clinton offered an amendment to the FY 2009 Budget Resolution calling for a one-year moratorium on abusive and unchecked no-bid contracts that have become commonplace under the Bush Administration and cost taxpayers at least $200 billion in fiscal year 2007 alone.

Source: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton