Democratic California Congresswoman Katie Porter came up with an interesting strategy to criticize GOP defense spending at a subcommittee hearing held by the House Oversight and Accountability Committee.
The Representative of California's 47th congressional district is known for her creative line of questioning witnesses at congressional hearings.
At Thursday's subcommittee hearing on financial accountability in the Department of Defense (DOD), Porter presented a huge placard resembling Jeopardy!'s game board to illustrate how lawmakers and lobbyists in Washington play the same game.
Only, Porter's version of the popular TV game show was called, JeoparDOD!
The attending witnesses included John Tenaglia from the Department of Defense, Brett Mansfield from the DOD Office of Inspector General, and Asif Khan of the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
Before starting the game, she kicked things off by commenting:
“In Washington, the same game is played every year: the president requests a massive defense budget, lawmakers don’t want to be seen as soft on national security, and defense lobbyists exploit that.”
Porter posted a clip of her time at the hearing and echoed the same observation in the caption.
"Each year, lawmakers and defense lobbyists play the same game, pouring hundreds of billions into the Pentagon without scrutinizing every dollar—and it's taxpayers who lose."
"Today, I invited witnesses to play JeoparDoD, to win oversight for the American people."
You can watch the twist on the Jeopardy! game, here.
She brought out the JeoparDOD! game board and had the witnesses answer questions from the following categories: waste, missing guardrails, and enablers.
Porter called on Tenaglia first.
He chose Enablers for 100 points.
Playing by the same rules as Jeopardy!, Porter read the answer first.
“The President who called how much we spend on defense ‘crazy,’ but let defense spending grow by over $100 billion in one term"
When Tenaglia failed to come up with the correct response, Porter said:
"Really? You don't know who called the defense budget 'crazy'?"
She then revealed the answer, which was:
"Who is Donald Trump?"
Next, Mansfield chose Enablers for 200.
Porter read:
"A member of Senate leadership who recently said funding the Pentagon at $886 billion would mean defense is radically underfunded."
Mansfield said he didn't know the answer, to which Porter revealed:
"Who is Mitch McConnell?"
Porter next called on Kahn and told him that he could "easily be the winner here."
He chose the category of Waste for 300.
"Great choice," said Porter and read:
"Ineffective DOD assets that cost about $600 million to build and are now being decommissioned before the end of their useful life?"
"I'm drawing a blank there, sorry," said Kahn.
To which Porter replied:
"What are littoral combat ships?"
She added:
"You familiar with this program."
After finishing a number of rounds, the final score tally was Mansfield with 500 points, Khan with 200, and Tenaglia coming in third with 100 points.
But it was Porter who won big. At least on Twitter.
Some were impressed at seeing the participating witnesses obliging her.
Using her announcer-y voice, Porter yielded her time by telling the floor:
"We're out of time for JeoparDOD and the winner here should be the American people, because no matter who uncovers the most waste, the important thing is that we provide long overdue oversight to the taxpayers.”
Prior to representing California's 47th congressional district, Porter became the first Democrat to be elected to represent the 45th congressional district covering south-central Orange County–which she represented from 2019 to 2023.
@lpeterp/Bluesky
@FPWellman/X
@bobsbeatgmail.com5/Threads