WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump’s administration recently announced a Buy American executive order in support of American manufacturers.

The order directs federal agencies to use products manufactured in the United States to satisfy federal contracts.

U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy released a statement saying that he urged Trump’s administration to increase accountability in terms of complying with the Buy American laws. Murphy’s announcement said that multiple non-partisan Government Accountability Office investigations found Buy American violations including the Department of Defense spending $18 million on aircraft parts that were manufactured outside the United States.

“There’s not a lot that President Trump and I agree on,” Murphy said. “But as I’ve said from the beginning, if President Trump is doing something to help Connecticut, I’ll work with him. I’ve been on a crusade for years to fix our broken Buy American laws, and I’m glad I’ve gotten to work with the president on this issue. It’s simple-we should be spending our taxpayer money on American-made goods, not goods made overseas. It grows manufacturing jobs, and it protects our national security.”

Murphy also hopes Congress passes the “Buy American” bill to improve transparency and support manufacturing jobs.

“The president’s new executive order is a good, small step forward, but we’ve got to do a lot more than just ‘encourage’ federal agencies to buy U.S. goods,” Murphy said. “We need to hold agencies accountable for actually doing that. The Department of Defense has over and over again exploited waivers to get around Buy American laws. We need to pass my  Act to increase transparency around who is actually getting these contracts, and then we need to go even further and close loopholes in the Buy American law.”

Murphy has also introduced the American Jobs Matter Act to solidify existing Buy American standards.

Alan Ortner, president of Sirois Tool, a Berlin manufacturer, said he is generally in favor of the Buy American law.

“It is good to see that both President Trump and Sen. Murphy want to act in a way that helps the U.S. manufacturing industry and protects our country’s intellectual property,” Ortner said.