Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General Audit Authority
Edition label: 2026-10
Definition: The statutory authority of the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General (DOJ OIG), under the Inspector General Act of 1978 as recodified at 5 U.S.C. §§ 401–424, to conduct audits and investigations of DOJ programs and operations.1
Overview
DOJ OIG is the Department’s principal audit and investigations office and has statutory independence,2 but 5 U.S.C. § 413 gives the Attorney General limited authority to control or prohibit work involving specified sensitive information, subject to written notice.3
Epstein Files Transparency Act compliance audit requests
Members of Congress asked DOJ OIG to audit the Department’s compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act as an independent check on implementation:4
- December 10, 2025 — Senators Schiff and Durbin sent a letter to Acting IG Don Berthiaume requesting a chain-of-custody audit of all Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA)-mandated files.5
- December 24, 2025 — Twelve senators (lead Blumenthal) sent a broader audit request covering five substantive compliance dimensions (redaction protection of survivors, redaction not shielding abusers, withholding-only-for-statutory-reasons, narrow-tailoring, and politics-free decisionmaking).6
The two letters together test whether the OIG audit pathway will produce an institutional accountability record on EFTA compliance separate from any record DOJ leadership chooses to produce.
Related Entities
- Don Berthiaume — Acting Inspector General as of December 2025
- Pam Bondi — Attorney General whose Department is the audit subject
- Todd Blanche — Deputy Attorney General whose December 19, 2025 letter described a rolling production after the Act’s deadline
Related Concepts
- Epstein Files Transparency Act — the substantive statutory regime being audited
- DOJ redaction dispute — the specific compliance question driving the audit requests
Source References
- Blumenthal, Richard, Lisa Murkowski, Jeffrey A. Merkley, et al. Letter to Don R. Berthiaume, Acting Inspector General, U.S. Department of Justice, requesting an audit of the Department’s compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act. U.S. Senate, December 24, 2025. — primary source for the institutional invocation of OIG audit authority on EFTA compliance
- Inspector General Act of 1978, as recodified at 5 U.S.C. §§ 401–424, Pub. L. No. 117-286, 136 Stat. 4196 (Dec. 27, 2022).
Open Questions
- Question: Will Berthiaume formally accept either or both letters as triggering an audit, and on what timeline?
- Question: Does the OIG have the statutory authority to compel cooperation from a politically appointed AG who actively obstructs the audit?
- Question: Did Congress as a body (a committee or either chamber) ask DOJ OIG to audit EFTA compliance, as distinct from the two groups of individually signing senators who sent the December 10 and December 24, 2025 letters?