Senator James Lankford is back with the ninth edition of his annual Federal Fumbles report, a greatest-hits list of government waste, fraud, and what-can-possibly-go-wrong spending decisions that together total billions of taxpayer dollars.

The Oklahoma Republican’s latest report flags everything from questionable research grants and weak oversight of money sent overseas to widespread fraud in food assistance programs and the eye-watering price tag of government shutdowns. Lankford says the pattern is simple: Washington keeps fumbling the ball, and taxpayers keep paying for it.

Among this year’s “Top Five Fumbles”: nearly $150,000 to study how COVID and climate change affect herring in Alaska, $124,000 sent to a Chinese lab for beagle experiments with limited U.S. oversight, a $250 million SNAP fraud scheme in Minnesota, a quarter-billion dollars in NIH-funded transgender experiments on animals, and the grand finale, a 43-day government shutdown that cost an estimated $74 to $85 billion.

Lankford’s report doesn’t just point fingers. It also lays out policy fixes, including cracking down on lingering COVID-era fraud, streamlining a disaster relief system spread across more than 30 agencies, and passing his Prevent Government Shutdowns Act to stop shutdowns from becoming Washington’s favorite negotiating tactic.

In short, Federal Fumbles argues that while the federal government keeps finding new ways to drop the ball, someone in Congress is at least keeping score, and promising to clean up the mess. You can read the entire report HERE.