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FIRST ON FOX: A Republican and a Democrat team up to break the centralized power structure in Washington, DC, with a new bill that moves federal agencies to other parts of the country.
Reps. Ashley Hinson, R-Iowa, and Jared Golden, D-Maine, are introducing a bill Tuesday to move certain U.S. government offices to other locations in the country’s 50 states, he told Fox News Digital.
Exceptions will be made for agencies focused on national security such as the Department of Justice, the Pentagon, the Department of Energy and the Department of State.
For other agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of the Interior, for example, the legislation would block new and old leases as well as major renewal permits, forcing them to look outside of the Washington, DC metropolitan area. new space
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Democratic Rep. Jared Golden is joining forces with Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson on a bill to move certain federal agencies out of Washington, DC, including the Department of Agriculture. (Getty Images)
It would then establish a “competitive bidding process” for other states to lease their land to the federal government, according to the bill’s text.
Hinson argued that he would transfer those agencies and offices to the states that rely most on their services.
“Federal Agency Movement outside Washington and closer to the people most affected will ensure that federal bureaucrats who have never left DC do not issue out-of-touch mandates that disproportionately hurt working families, small businesses, and our farmers who feed and feed the world ” he told Fox. Digital News.
Hinson added that there was “no valid reason” for the USDA to operate in Washington, D.C., when it could be in its home state of Iowa, for example.
It would exclude agencies focused on national security, such as the Justice Department. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Golden, which also references the industry in his home state from Mainetold Fox News Digital: “No one knows better than fishermen what it takes to make a living on the water, or the threat that new far-flung regulations could pose not only to their livelihoods, but to throughout your community or region.”
“Redistributing federal agencies and jobs across the country would bring government closer to the people, ensure regulators are embedded in communities that thrive or struggle based on their decisions, and take good-paying jobs out of the bypass and to communities across the country,” he said.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, who has introduced a counterpart bill in the Senate, said the legislation was intended to “restrict the administrative state that has run unchecked at the expense of the taxpayer.”
It was not immediately clear what effect that would have on employment levels in Washington, DC, where the federal government is the largest employer. It is also unclear what the overall costs of transferring agencies might be.
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But lawmakers argued it would ultimately save taxpayers money by conducting necessary oversight of federal leases, at a time when some spaces are still largely unused due to remote work policies left over from the COVID-19 pandemic. 19.
The bill would also direct the federal government to use funds from the sale of any federal land or building to offset relocation costs.
