A watchdog report has found that the kind of systemic failures that enabled the high-profile prison deaths of gangster Whitey Bulger and financier Jeffrey Epstein also contributed to the deaths of hundreds of other federal prisoners over the years.

Recent assaults on two notorious, high-profile federal prisoners have renewed concerns about whether the federal Bureau of Prisons is capable of keeping people in its custody safe.

The Justice Department’s watchdog says negligence, misconduct and job failures enabled Jeffrey Epstein to take his own life at a federal jail in New York City while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

Sexual abuse in the nation’s federal prisons must be rooted out.

House Republicans have begun their promised aggressive oversight of the Biden administration.

Inspectors general need more authority to go after fraud in the COVID-19 relief programs, the independent committee overseeing federal pandemic relief spending said Tuesday.

The Justice Department’s internal watchdog has launched an investigation after revelations that former President Donald Trump’s administration secretly seized phone data from at least two House Democrats.

Former President Donald Trump waves to the members of the media on arrival at Palm Beach International Airport in West Palm Beach, Fla., Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)WASHINGTON – The Justice Department’s inspector general is launching an investigation to examine whether any former or current department officials “engaged in an improper attempt” to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Inspector General Michael Horowitz said Monday that the investigation will investigate allegations concerning the conduct of former and current Justice Department officials but will not extend to other government officials. Republican governors in Arizona and Georgia, key battleground states won by Biden, also vouched for the integrity of the elections in their states. Nearly all the legal challenges from Trump and his allies have been dismissed by judges, including two tossed by the Supreme Court, which includes three justices nominated by Trump.

(Al Drago/Pool via AP)WASHINGTON Government watchdogs are warning that legal decisions by the Trump administration could severely limit their ability to oversee more than $1 trillion in spending related to the coronavirus pandemic. In a letter to four congressional committees, a panel of inspectors general overseeing a sweeping economic rescue law said an ambiguity in the law could block the watchdogs from conducting independent oversight. This would present potentially significant transparency and oversight issues because (the spending in question) includes over $1 trillion in funding, the letter says. The agency has only provided general information, such as the total amounts of loans awarded in a given time period. A House subcommittee overseeing the coronavirus aid demanded Monday that the Trump administration and some of the nations largest banks turn over detailed information about companies that applied for and received federal loans.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - The Justice Department and FBI are reviewing a draft of the long-awaited report on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court applications regarding the Trump campaign, the department's inspector general said Friday. The inspector general has been investigating since early 2018 the handling of four applications that let American intelligence eavesdrop on Carter Page in 2016 and 2017 after he left the Trump campaign. Horowitz noted that the report contained classified material, and that once he receives the draft back from DOJ and FBI, his office would prepare the report for release, "ensuring that appropriate reviews occur for accuracy and comment purposes." Horowitz's review is one of several probes into the origins of the Russia investigation. He told CNN this week that he expected to call Horowitz to testify after his report was released, and he also might bring in former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos to testify.