A new bill would mandate that federally issued credit cards get deactivated as soon as a government employee leaves their job, after an audit earlier this year found there were more active federal credit cards than employees.
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), the Senate DOGE Caucus boss, is introducing the Deactivating and Eliminating Cards Linked to Inactive or Nonexistent Employees (DECLINE) Act to cancel those credit cards.
“Taxpayers should not be footing the bill for bureaucrats to swipe away at casinos, night clubs and bars,” Ernst told The Post in a statement.
“It is long past time to DECLINE these absurd payments and ensure that when a federal employee stops working, their taxpayer-funded credit card does too. Bygone bureaucrats shouldn’t be allowed to treat government credit cards like gifts cards.”
Earlier this year, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) conducted an analysis that found Uncle Sam had 4.6 million active credit cards that were used for roughly $40 billion worth of spending in over 90 million transactions last fiscal year
Bureau of Labor Statistics data at the time revealed that the federal government only employed about 3 million people.
Since then, DOGE has worked to scrap hundreds of thousands of government-issued credit cards and tighten internal rules over how they get managed.
In addition to DOGE’s findings, the Pentagon’s inspector general determined that the Department of War was billed for some 8,000 credit card transactions at “high-risk locations” such as casino ATMs within the past year.
There were also 3,246 transactions at nightclubs and bars, including during the Super Bowl and major holidays such as New Year’s Eve, per the watchdog report.
The Hawkeye State Republican, who announced last week that she won’t vie for reelection in the 2026 cycle, has asked the Government Accountability Office to conduct an extensive review of policies governing agency-issued credit cards.
Ernst also pointed to known examples of blatant fraud with government-issued credit cards.
For example, a Fort Benning military cardholder billed taxpayers $30,000 for personal goods — including charges that went unnoticed by the feds after the cardholder retired.
An Army recruiter was also found to have given his government credit card to a pal who splurged some $13,000 on food, automotive parts, and more.
There have also been fraud cases prosecuted by the Justice Department, including a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) employee who pushed credit card applications to JPMorgan Chase & Co for fake employees and a Texas National Guardsman who stole government fuel credit cards and was later forced to pay a $75,000 fine.
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