Waste of the Day: Foreign Swimming Pools Get $1.2 Million

Topline: The State Department spent $1.2 million on upgrades to swimming pools in seven foreign countries in the last four years, according to an analysis from Sen. Joni Ernst’s office published in the New York Post.

Swimming pools at American embassies or mission residences

Key facts: Ernst’s review of federal spending data on USAspending.gov revealed 14 purchases for swimming pools at embassies or mission residences during President Biden’s administration, mostly to renovate existing pools instead of installing new ones. 

A $130,000 purchase in Harare, Zimbabwe, helped buy pool covers and other upgrades. There was $40,000 spent on a “swimming pool sewer pump replacement” in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, three months after Russia invaded Ukraine.

There were five pool-related purchases in Iraq, including $444,000 to replace a dehumidification system in Baghdad, FOX News reported.

A new pool deck in Sudan cost $21,000 in 2021, alongside two other purchases in Sudan. Since 2023, the U.S. embassy in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, has been closed because of safety concerns during the armed conflict in the region.

There were also two pool contracts in Haiti and one each in Ghana and Indonesia.

Search all federal, state and local salaries and vendor spending with the world’s largest government spending database at OpenTheBooks.com. 

Critical quote: In a statement to FOX News, Ernst claimed,

The Biden State Department threw a blowout summer pool party on your dime. Bureaucrats might think wasting millions is a drop in the bucket, but I am sick and tired of taxpayers getting tossed in the deep end by Washington.

Summary: There is little reason to be funding overseas swimming pools when our own country is drowning in debt.

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This article was originally published by RealClearInvestigations and made available via RealClearWire.