27 Inspector General Posts Vacant 20 Months After the Watchdog Firings, With Nominees for Only Six
Oversight.gov, the shared website of the federal inspectors general, lists 27 vacant IG posts as of October 2026. About 20 of them are posts the President fills with Senate confirmation. Only six have a nominee pending.
Several have been empty since the night of 24 January 2025, when at least 17 inspectors general were fired by email. They include Interior, State, Housing and Urban Development, the Environmental Protection Agency, Transportation, Energy, Education and the Office of Personnel Management. Treasury’s IG post has been vacant since 2019.
The firings and the court
The USAID inspector general was fired in February 2025 and the Export-Import Bank’s in October, bringing the total to 19. At least five acting IGs were also removed.
Eight of the fired IGs sued. In September 2025 Judge Ana Reyes ruled that the firings were unlawful, because the law requires the President to give Congress 30 days’ notice and a reason before removing an IG. She declined to reinstate anyone, saying the remedy wouldn’t fix the harm, and paused the case while the Supreme Court considered removal power in Trump v. Slaughter. That case was decided on 29 June 2026, 6 to 3, overruling the 1935 Humphrey’s Executor precedent for FTC commissioners. It didn’t address inspectors general. The IG case has resumed in district court.
Who fills the posts
Some posts have been filled. By February 2026 at least eight nominees had been confirmed, and six of them had served as political appointees in the administration. In August the Senate confirmed Don Berthiaume, a career IG official, at the Justice Department.
The Education Department shows how unsettled things are. In September the President withdrew one nominee and nominated another, Mark Priebe, who then left the office, so a career official is acting again. GAO guidance says a nominee generally can’t serve as acting IG at the same time.
Democrats have introduced S. 3687, which would bar a president from naming his own former political appointees as IGs. It hasn’t moved.
Less money, fewer reports
In September 2025 OMB withheld funds from the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, the IGs’ joint body, and at least 15 IG websites went dark. About $4.3 million was restored in November.
The fiscal 2027 budget asks for cabinet IG offices to get about 12% less than in fiscal 2024 on average, with Interior and Justice down 28% and Commerce 21%. The Partnership for Public Service found that in the first half of fiscal 2026 cabinet IGs issued 25% fewer investigative reports and 6% fewer audits than their 2020 to 2024 average, with staff 19% smaller.
The watchdogs of the watchdogs have problems too. A GAO report in June found that CIGIE’s Integrity Committee had received more than 16,200 complaints from 2020 to 2025 and completed 15 investigations.
What IGs still find
The offices still produce work that makes news. On 30 September the Federal Reserve’s IG reported that construction costs for the Fed’s headquarters renovation had more than doubled to $2.5 billion, but found no misconduct by Jerome Powell. IGs at the Pentagon are running the oversight of the Iran war.
Why it matters
Inspectors general were created in 1978 to give each large agency an internal auditor that reports to Congress as well as to the agency head. They find waste and fraud that otherwise surfaces late or not at all, a point GAO makes on its high-risk list. An acting IG can do the job, but acting officials have less independence and shorter horizons.
Congress can change that. The Senate confirms IGs, appropriators set their budgets, and the 30-day notice law could be given teeth with a reinstatement remedy. None of that has happened yet.