(The Center Square) – Of the 15 federal executive departments that compose the president’s Cabinet, the Departments of War and Veterans Affairs have the most unresolved, open recommendations for improvement from congressional watchdog, the Government Accountability Office.
The Department of War, which is overwhelmingly the largest executive branch department with about 3 million military and civilian personnel, has the most by far, with 778 open recommendations stretching back to 2011. Forty-eight of those were marked as priority. The Department of Veterans Affairs is the second-largest executive department, with more than 450,000 employees, and it has the second-highest, with 180 unresolved recommendations going back to 2012 and 22 flagged as priority.
The Government Accountability Office was established by Congress in 1921 as an independent, non-partisan congressional watchdog agency founded to “investigate all matters related to the use of public funds.” It provides reports to congressional committees and subcommittees on various government departments, agencies and projects to inform legislation and oversight.
Those reports typically include a list of recommendations for how the report’s subject can be improved. The recommendations are divided into priority action items and non-priority action items based on what is most pressing or important.
The War Department has some unresolved open priority recommendations from the office dating back to 2013 on topics like the poor living conditions in military barracks, improper TRICARE payments, fraud risk management and sustainment of the F-35 fighter jet program. Of all of the department’s open priority recommendations, it has partially addressed 15.
Many of the VA’s open priority recommendations are related to the department’s attempts to replace its legacy health records system. It rolled out a new electronic health records system starting with five medical centers in 2023 and was “making incremental improvements” to the new system as of March 2025, according to GAO, but there was still a lot to be done. There are approximately 170 VA Medical Centers.
The VA’s oldest unresolved priority recommendation concerns its “incomplete” sexual harassment policies and dates back to a 2020 report. The department has resolved all priority recommendations through 2019, according to GAO records, meaning the 22 that are open only date back to 2020. Of those, the VA has partially addressed five.
Some departments have open recommendations dating back to the early 2000s.
After the War Department and the VA, the Departments of Energy, Homeland Security and Health and Human Services have the most unresolved GAO recommendations, at 163, 160, and 149, respectively. About 6% of the War Department’s unresolved recommendations are classified as priority, while 12% of the VA’s are.
