Title: Heightened Oversight of Travel, Eating, and Lodging Act of 2018
Policy area: Government Operations and Politics

Summary:
Heightened Oversight of Travel, Eating, and Lodging Act of 2018
This bill prohibits a federal agency from reimbursing an employee's lodging costs at an establishment that is owned by, or that employs, certain public officials or their relatives.

[Congressional Bills 115th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 5304 Introduced in House (IH)]

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115th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 5304

To prohibit Federal agencies from using Government funds to pay for the 
  lodging of agency employees at establishments that are owned by or 
          employ certain public officials or their relatives.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 15, 2018

  Mr. Raskin (for himself, Mr. Cohen, Ms. Jayapal, Ms. McCollum, Mrs. 
  Lawrence, and Mr. Brendan F. Boyle of Pennsylvania) introduced the 
 following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Oversight and 
                           Government Reform

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To prohibit Federal agencies from using Government funds to pay for the 
  lodging of agency employees at establishments that are owned by or 
          employ certain public officials or their relatives.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Heightened Oversight of Travel, 
Eating, and Lodging Act of 2018''.

SEC. 2. LIMITATION ON USE OF GOVERNMENT PER DIEM.

    (a) Definitions.--In this section--
            (1) the term ``agency'' means--
                    (A) an Executive agency (as defined in section 105 
                of title 5, United States Code), a military department 
                (as defined in section 102 of title 5, United States 
                Code), or any other establishment in the executive 
                branch (including the Executive Office of the 
                President, the United States Postal Service, and the 
                Postal Regulatory Commission);
                    (B) an office, agency, or other establishment in 
                the legislative branch; and
                    (C) an office, agency, or other establishment in 
                the judicial branch;
            (2) the term ``covered individual'' means--
                    (A) the President;
                    (B) a relative of the President; and
                    (C) with respect to an agency that is an Executive 
                department, the head of the Executive department;
            (3) the term ``employee'' means an individual employed in 
        or under an agency, including an individual employed 
        intermittently in the Government service as an expert or 
        consultant and paid on a daily when-actually-employed basis and 
        an individual serving without pay or at $1 a year;
            (4) the term ``Executive department'' has the meaning given 
        the term in section 101 of title 5, United States Code;
            (5) the term ``per diem allowance'' means a per diem 
        allowance, as defined in section 5701 of title 5, United States 
        Code, or any similar allowance to which an employee is 
        entitled, including any amounts made available to the head or 
        other senior officer of an agency to pay for subsistence or 
        other expenses related to travel;
            (6) the term ``relative'' has the meaning given the term in 
        section 3110(a) of title 5, United States Code; and
            (7) the term ``travel reimbursement'' means reimbursement 
        for actual and necessary expenses of official travel under 
        section 5702 of title 5, United States Code, or any similar 
        reimbursement to which an employee is entitled.
    (b) Prohibition.--An agency may not provide an employee of the 
agency a per diem allowance or travel reimbursement for the cost of 
lodging at an establishment--
            (1) in which a covered individual has a private ownership 
        interest or beneficial interest; or
            (2) that employs a covered individual.
    (c) Exception.--
            (1) In general.--Subsection (b) shall not apply to 
        expenditures by the United States Secret Service or any other 
        agency for protective mission purposes relating to the 
        protection of an employee of an Executive department.
            (2) Reporting requirement.--Not later than 90 days after 
        the date on which an agency makes an expenditure that would be 
        prohibited under subsection (b) but for the exception under 
        paragraph (1) of this subsection, the agency shall submit a 
        report describing the expenditure to the Office of Government 
        Ethics.
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