Congressman Flood Joins Call for Investigation into Biden’s Department of Homeland Security

WASHINGTON, D.C.—U.S. Congressman Flood and Oversight Committee Republicans are raising concerns that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is potentially using taxpayer dollars to purchase solar panels and components from China to rebuild the U.S. Virgin Islands’ (USVI) energy grid.

“According to the U.S. Department of State, genocide and slave labor in the Xinjiang region of China are being actively perpetrated against the Uyghur minority. As you know, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) prevents the U.S. purchase or importation of goods made with forced labor in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China,” wrote the lawmakers. “We strongly support the UFLPA but remain troubled the United States may still possibly be using taxpayer dollars to purchase products manufactured using slave labor in direct violation of the UFLPA, and nowhere has this possibility become more real and concerning than in the U.S. Virgin Islands.”

Following Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017, the federal government committed nearly $8 billion to assist with disaster relief in the USVI, with almost $5 billion of those dollars coming from FEMA. A large sum of the disaster relief funds was allocated to bolster and rebuild the USVI’s energy grid. In addition, the USVI announced in 2021 that FEMA funds will be funneled to a new 28-megawatt solar micro-grid project on St. Croix.

Here is a full copy of the letter. Congressman Flood is a member of the Committee on House Oversight and Reform as well as the Committee on Small Business.