Abolish EDA—or consolidate grant decisions under political Assistant Secretary control
Mandate prefers abolishing the Economic Development Administration and reallocating funds to overlapping grant programs; if not, consolidate decision-making in the Assistant Secretary’s office to align funding with conservative purposes (e.g., rural energy communities), leverage Trump-era direct-hire authorities, and continue Opportunity Zones-style approaches.
Mandate
Mandate Ch. 21 (Commerce) — EDA: more efficient to abolish EDA and reallocate funding to overlapping federal grant programs; if unachievable, consolidate decision-making to the Assistant Secretary’s office to better align funding with conservative political purposes; leverage direct-hire authorities; build on Opportunity Zones.
Undo plan
1) Keep EDA as a statutory economic-development agency with competitive, needs-based criteria.
2) Reverse politicized grant alignment that steers awards by ideology.
3) Restore regional-office technical capacity with anti-fraud controls—not patronage hiring alone.
4) Separate disaster relief surge staffing from permanent politicization.
5) Verify: published award criteria and IG sampling of political interference.