The congressional “power of the purse” refers to the power of Congress to appropriate funds and to prescribe the conditions governing the use of those funds. Congress exercises this power by providing budget authority, which is authority provided by federal law to enter into financial obligations that will result in immediate or future outlays involving federal government funds. For the purposes of this report, “alternative sources of funding” refers to collections that are available to DOJ to obligate and expend. Some of these collections, known as offsetting collections, are available for obligation and expenditure without further legislative action. Others, however, called offsetting receipts, cannot be used without being appropriated. Examples of the various types of collections at DOJ include fees from regulated industries, such as fees associated with the federal bankruptcy system collected through the United States Trustee Program; the collection of fines, settlements, and other penalties associated with criminal and civil litigation activities; businesslike transactions such as the Bureau of Prisons’ Federal Prison Industries (FPI) sale of goods and services; and CJIS fingerprint checks fees. Congress typically appropriates and conducts oversight of funds for DOJ at the account level, directing that accounts be used for specific purposes, restricting the amount or purpose for which the funds can be used, and at times requiring DOJ to report on activities conducted at the For each alternative source of funding, Congress must account level.provide DOJ authority to (1) collect amounts, (2) conduct the activity in question, and (3) obligate and expend the funds collected on that activity. In each of these three areas, Congress can delegate some flexibility to agencies in how they exercise these authorities, or it can retain control. Regardless of the flexibility Congress provides DOJ regarding alternative sources of funding, it always retains oversight over the funding and associated activities. Figure 1 outlines key characteristics through which Congress may increase or decrease an agency’s flexibility in funding. The President’s Budget provides agencies’ estimated and actual budget authority, obligations, and unobligated balances, among other things. Total budgetary resources are also reported annually in an agency’s statement of budgetary resources, which is published in either a performance and accountability report, or an agency financial report. Whereas the President’s Budget provides information used by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for planning and controls, the financial reports prepared by agencies are required as part of the Chief Financial Officers Act of 1990, as amended.with the financial reports are subject to audit. Seven alternative sources of funding made up approximately 15 percent of DOJ’s total budgetary resources in fiscal year 2013, and different legislative requirements affect the agency’s flexibility in using these funds. Specifically, DOJ had about $4.3 billion in collections from seven major alternative sources of funding in 2013, and generally used this funding for related program costs. In addition, agency flexibility regarding using the seven funding sources varied with laws specifying funding purposes, amounts, and availability. In fiscal year 2013, about 15 percent of DOJ’s total budgetary resources—or $5.8 billion out of $39.5 billion—came from seven major alternative sources of funding. Specifically, during fiscal year 2013, collections for these seven sources totaled about $4.3 billion, which was available to DOJ to obligate. DOJ also brought forward $1.3 billion in unobligated balances from fiscal year 2012 for these seven sources. In addition to collections that DOJ had the authority to use, in fiscal year 2013, DOJ received deposits of about $1.6 billion from two of the seven alternative sources of funding that were by law not available for the department to obligate, and therefore not counted as a budgetary resource. The seven major alternative sources of funding are the following: Assets Forfeiture Fund: The AFF receives monies from the proceeds of forfeiture of assets used in criminal operations. Proceeds deposited in the AFF are used to pay for expenses of the Asset Forfeiture Program, including asset management and disposal, the equity of innocent third parties and lienholders, equitable sharing payments, program investigative expenses, and other authorized expenses of the program. Crime Victims Fund: Criminal fines and penalties collected from offenders, among other sources, are deposited in the CVF. The CVF funds victims’ assistance programs and provides direct compensation to crime victims. Criminal Justice Information Services fingerprint checks fees: CJIS, a division of the FBI, collects fees from federal, state, and other authorized entities requesting fingerprint identification records for noncriminal justice purposes such as employment and licensing. Fees collected pay for the costs of providing the service and for the automation of fingerprint identification and other criminal justice information services. Diversion Control Fee Account (DCFA): Fees paid by Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) registrants, such as manufacturers, distributors, dispensers (including physicians), importers, and exporters of controlled substances (such as narcotics and stimulants) and certain listed chemicals (such as ephedrine) are deposited in the DCFA. Fees collected are used to recover the full costs of the program, including personnel costs and operation costs such as investigative costs, travel, and the purchase of goods and services. Federal Prison Industries, Inc.: FPI, a wholly owned government corporation within the Bureau of Prisons (BOP), sells products and services manufactured by federal inmates.for FPI program expenses, such as wages for federal inmates. Three Percent Fund: DOJ collects 3 percent of most amounts paid resulting from “civil debt collection litigation activities,” including civil judgments in Medicare fraud cases and student loan collections. DOJ uses these funds to defray costs associated with its debt collection activities, such as paying the costs of the Debt Collection Management Staff (DCM) and financial litigation unit personnel and activities at the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices. United States Trustee System Fund (USTSF): The U.S. Trustee Program (USTP) receives and deposits in the USTSF fees collected generally from four sources: (1) a portion of the filing fee paid at the beginning of each bankruptcy case for chapters 7, 11, 12, and 13; (2) chapter 11 quarterly fees; (3) excess percentage fees collected by chapter 12 or chapter 13 standing trustees; and (4) interest on invested funds. These fees are used by the USTP for expenses, such as salaries and benefits, related to overseeing the bankruptcy process as specified in annual appropriations acts. To determine collections, obligations, and unobligated balance amounts for the seven alternative sources of funding, we relied on data that were reconciled to DOJ’s audited financial statements. DOJ was able to reconcile the data for six of the seven alternative sources for fiscal years 2009 through 2013. For the CJIS fingerprint checks fees, as part of our procedures, we obtained collections, obligations, and unobligated balances data from the FBI program offices for fiscal years 2009 through 2013. To validate the data provided, we requested that the FBI reconcile these amounts with the FBI’s audited statement of budgetary resources (SBR) for those respective periods. The FBI provided updated amounts for fiscal year 2013 based on its reconciliation to the FBI’s audited SBR. However, the FBI was unable to demonstrate that it could reconcile amounts it provided for fiscal years 2009 through 2012 to the amounts in its audited SBR for each of the respective years. For the purposes of this report, we will be reporting CJIS fingerprint checks fees data for fiscal years 2009 through 2012 as reported to us by the FBI. Of the seven major alternative sources of funding, the two with the highest amount of deposits were the AFF and the CVF, each receiving deposits of $10.5 billion and $10.4 billion respectively over the 5-year time period, not all of which was available to DOJ to obligate. The remaining five alternative sources of funding brought in collections totaling $9.0 billion during this same time period. Generally, collections from the seven major alternative sources of funding were obligated to support the associated programs or activities. For example, fees collected and deposited into the DCFA paid for all expenses required to run the Diversion Control Program. For all seven major alternative sources of funding, DOJ obligated about $22.8 billion, or on average about $4.6 billion a year, from fiscal years 2009 through 2013. Specifically, for five of the seven alternative sources of funding—CJIS fingerprint checks fees, DCFA, FPI, the Three Percent Fund, and USTSF—DOJ obligated about 97 percent of total collections, or about $8.8 billion of $9.0 billion collected. For the two remaining alternative sources of funding—the CVF and the AFF—DOJ obligated about $14.0 billion. The AFF and the CVF included deposits that, pursuant to law, have not been available for obligation. At the end of fiscal year 2013, about $9.7 billion from the AFF and the CVF was unavailable for obligation by DOJ. The majority of this amount came from the CVF, which will be discussed in more detail later in this report. While the majority of DOJ’s alternative sources of funding came from these seven sources, DOJ has other alternative sources of funding, which are listed in appendix I. In addition, appendix III provides more detail on collections and obligations for the seven major alternative sources of funding, including relevant legal requirements. Congress has used different options to either increase or decrease agency flexibility related to the use of DOJ’s seven major alternative sources of funding. As previously discussed, Congress establishes agency flexibility through the requirements in authorizing legislation, appropriation acts, or other laws that, for instance, require agencies to obligate the funds in a given year or over multiple years, or obligate a certain amount for a certain purpose.