Defense Department Oversight Thwarted By Defense Department Officials Who Refused To Talk About Trump's Communications

from the cut-to-DoD-officials-tying-gags-over-their-own-mouths dept

Every presidential administration seems to make a game of thwarting oversight. The current one is no different. President Trump is setting himself apart from the pack by firing IGs at an alarming pace. Whatever's being done in our name at various government agencies is being done in the dark. Whistleblowers and leakers are being hunted down and persecuted/prosecuted (another favorite presidential sport).

What would be considered unlawful obstruction in a criminal investigation is just business as usual at the Executive branch. The latest (but certainly not the last) obstruction was revealed in the investigation of the "JEDI" contract procedure. Amazon really wanted to be a part of American bloodsports, but was beaten out by Microsoft for lucrative Pentagon cloud storage contracts. Amazon sued, alleging it got illegally screwed by the President, claiming his frequent derogatory comments about Amazon and the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post pushed the Pentagon towards selecting Microsoft.

An investigation was opened by the Defense Department's Inspector General. And we'll never know what really happened because it appears the administration inserted itself into the investigation. Jacqueline Feldscher has more details at Politico:

The Pentagon’s inspector general “could not definitively determine” whether the White House influenced the procurement process for a major cloud computing contract because senior Defense Department officials were barred from answering questions on the subject during interviews, according to a 313-page report released on Wednesday.

Sticking it to the Deep State, I guess. So, what looks like some impropriety now officially only looks like some impropriety because the Defense Department's general counsel told DoD officials to not answer any questions about communications between the DoD and the White House. "Presidential communications privilege" successfully asserted.

Given the lack of answers, it seems pretty ridiculous for the Pentagon to hang the "Mission Accomplished" banner and declare everything to be above-board. But that's what has happened because that's the the kind of government we have. Here's the Pentagon's spokesperson pretending there's nothing to see here.

"This report should finally close the door on the media and corporate-driven attacks on the career procurement officials who have been working tirelessly to get the much needed JEDI cloud computing environment into the hands of our frontline warfighters while continuing to protect American taxpayers."

Everything is over except its eventual fading into obscurity, washed under the flotsam that is the day-to-day horror of living in an ongoing pandemic. The Pentagon has cleared itself of any wrongdoing by refusing to answer questions related to alleged wrongdoing. The overseers were neutralized by presidential privilege, resulting in the Inspector General drawing inconclusions the Pentagon has declared to be exculpatory with one comment to the press. The IG's office decided to release the incomplete report anyway, stating it did not want to further delay any reporting on its non-findings since it was apparent no amount of waiting things out was going to get these officials to discuss things they didn't want to discuss.

As for Amazon, it must be refreshing to be on the other side of impropriety accusations for once. The run-up to the awarding of the contract saw a few DoD officials becoming far too friendly with the cloud service provider.

The inspector general substantiated allegations of ethical misconduct against Deap Ubhi, a Pentagon employee who worked on the early stages of crafting the JEDI program before leaving the department to work for Amazon.

Investigators did not, however, find evidence of ethical misconduct by other senior defense officials, including former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who attended a dinner with Amazon officials organized by his former aide Sally Donnelly.

Ah. Well, at least the IG found out something about somebody. The President's dislike for Amazon and Bezos remains under "presidential privilege" wraps and the swamp will continue draining at its current rate of 0 liters/flush.

Filed Under: communications, contract, dod, donald trump, inspector general, jedi, oversight, retaliation, transparency
Companies: amazon, microsoft

Donald Trump Fires Inspector General Who Brought Ukraine Phone Call Whistleblower Complaint To Congress

from the just-more-retaliation-targeting-the-proper-channels dept

No one really needs to wait until Friday afternoon to bury bad news. Not these days when bad news is all we seem to have, occasionally mixed with even worse news. But the White House remains the White House, so the time-honored process of dumping stuff you want to stay out of the headlines right before everyone punches out for the weekend remains in place.

The government as a whole claims it wants whistleblowers to report wrongdoing through the proper channels. It then routinely follows this up by ensuring the proper channels remain the best way to see good deeds punished.

The whistleblower that reported President Trump's inappropriate conversation with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky saw their report buried by the White House's Office of Legal Counsel. So much for the proper channels. President Trump himself asked for the whistleblower to be outed, undermining the protections the federal government has established to ensure wrongdoing is reported.

The only party receptive to the whistleblower's complaints has now been fired by President Trump, closing the loop on the White House's retaliatory actions.

President Donald Trump on Friday fired Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson, who had told Congress about the whistleblower complaint that led to Trump's impeachment, the President told Congress in a letter obtained by CNN.

So, there's another spot open in the administration -- one that will probably be filled by an underqualified suck-up, rather than someone who can actually do the job. Trump's faith in appointees often appears to be directly related to how good they make him look, rather than how well they do their jobs.

"As is the case with regard to other positions where I, as President, have the power of appointment ... it is vital that I have the fullest confidence in the appointees serving as inspectors general," Trump wrote. "That is no longer the case with regard to this Inspector General."

Atkinson's response letter is worth reading. It makes it clear his firing was politically motivated and had nothing to do with his ability to carry out his duties.

It is hard not to think that the President's loss of confidence in me derives from my having faithfully discharged my legal obligations as an independent and impartial Inspector General, and from my commitment to continue to do so.

More of the same from this administration, which isn't all that different from the actions of the administrations that preceded Trump's. Whistleblowers get punished. Those aiding whistleblowers in their efforts by following the law are also retaliated against with alarming frequency.

This is what whistleblower laws are supposed to deter. But they're ultimately toothless, especially when it comes to presidential appointees who can be hired and fired at will. Since the protections only go so far, whistleblowers are likely to be deterred by appointees inhabiting the "proper channels," who may selectively bury reports to ensure their own employment continues. Those that do pass on information that will displease the administration put their own necks on the line, and that's the sort of ideal that rarely has a 100% participation rate in Washington, DC.

It would be nice if these protections -- and the rules against retaliation -- were respected across the board. But they'll never be. They'll only be used when they're politically expedient.

Filed Under: donald trump, friday night massacre, inspector general, leaks, michael atkinson, retaliation, whistleblower protections, whistleblowers

Defense Department Watchdog Says Retaliation Against Whistleblowers Is The Rule, Not The Exception

from the coloring-outside-the-lines-is-still-the-best-option dept

The more things change, the more whistleblowers still don't have protections worth a shit. President Trump is waging a war on whistleblowers -- about the only thing he's doing that isn't the polar opposite of his predecessor. For three straight presidencies, government employees seeking to report wrongdoing and misconduct have been shut down, ignored, and retaliated against, despite periodic protections being erected by legislators.

The Defense Department's watchdog made it clear during recent testimony that things are no better at the agencies he oversees. Eric Katz of Government Executive has more details.

Officials at the Defense Department are not taking action when the inspector general validates allegations of whistleblower reprisal, Glenn Fine, who is currently performing the duties of the Pentagon’s IG, told a panel of the House Oversight and Reform Committee. He called it critical that management take prompt remedial action and called on Congress to take action when the department fails to do so.

“Recently, we’ve seen a disturbing trend of the [Defense Department] disagreeing with the results of our investigation or not taking disciplinary action in whistleblower reprisal cases without adequate or persuasive explanations,” Fine said. “Failure to take action sends a message to agency managers that reprisal will be tolerated and also to potential whistleblowers [that they] will not be protected.”

Since no one really wants to protect whistleblowers, whistleblowers aren't being protected. Fine may want to protect whistleblowers, but his hands are tied. He can accept reports and pass them on, but he can't do anything meaningful to deter reprisal because his powers are (purposefully) limited and the protections paper-thin. He can only hope his oversight -- Congress -- takes this issue as seriously as he does.

But it seems unlikely Congress will help. The President himself has threatened the whistleblower who reported Trump's inappropriate phone call with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky. Other legislators have made similar statements, expressing their displeasure with anyone who would insinuate their president is anything but an upstanding example for all Americans.

The chilling effect of these statements and actions is real.

A recent Government Executive survey found one-in-three federal employees are now less likely to report wrongdoing to the appropriate authorities due to attacks by Trump and congressional Republicans on the whistleblower whose filing kicked off the impeachment proceedings. Another 16% said they are now more likely to blow the whistle.

More than 50 Inspector Generals signed a letter condemning the White House Office of Legal Counsel's opinion that it's cool and legal to unilaterally block whistleblower reports. But this -- and Fine's statements -- are being lobbed into a highly-unreceptive atmosphere. This administration doesn't want to hear the shrill, nonstop sound of dozens of blown whistles... no more than the last one did. A threatened whistleblower is a silenced whistleblower and for far too many government agencies -- and the legislators that oversee them -- no news is the best news. Is it any wonder so many whistleblowers opt out of this corrupted system?

Filed Under: defense department, donald trump, inspector general, retaliation, whistleblowers

VA's Whistleblower Office Retaliated Against Whistleblowers And Buried Complaints

from the as-usual-we-are-all-shocked-SHOCKED-that-this-would-turn-out-this-way dept

I think President Trump likes the idea of whistleblowers. As long as they're coughing up tips about Deep State conspiracies against the administration, he's probably cool with it. No one's done that yet, so he's stuck battling whistleblowers who are blowing the whistle in his general direction.

Whistleblower protections aren't what they should be. There are laws on the books and guidelines in every agency policy manual that affirm the need to protect whistleblowers from retaliation. Those who have actually blown the whistle -- and used the proper channels -- realize those pretty words don't mean much when government agencies and officials are deeply invested in self-preservation. Trump's call to unmask the Ukraine phone call whistleblower is just a very public expression of the federal government's general antipathy towards accountability.

An office set up by the Trump administration specifically to collect evidence of misconduct and wrongdoing at the Department of Veterans Affairs has done the opposite of what was asked of it. The VA's Inspector General was asked to investigate by several senators who raised concerns about the office's refusal to implement whistleblower protections. It seemed to prefer to engage in retaliation, as the OIG report [PDF] confirms.

The office Trump established -- the VA Office of Accountability and Whistleblower Protection (OAWP) -- turned out to be completely misnamed. Some of this the Inspector General has chalked up to insufficient training and unclear policies. But what's detailed in this part of the report looks like nothing more than people doing the wrong thing intentionally to protect the people they actually want to protect -- a group that doesn't include whistleblowers.

From June 2017 to May 2018, the OAWP referred 2,526 submissions to other VA program offices, facilities, or other components that were not all equipped to undertake such investigations and without adequate measures to track the referrals or safeguards to protect whistleblowers’ identities. Of these, at least 51 involved allegations of whistleblower retaliation by a supervisor (and so properly within the investigative authority of the OAWP). Complainants were not always advised of these referrals. Without guidance, OAWP personnel did not take sufficient steps to protect complainants’ identities and prevent their concerns from being sent to the very facilities or network offices where the complainant worked or that were the subject of the allegations.

The OAWP also failed to establish safeguards sufficient to protect whistleblowers from becoming the subject of retaliatory investigations. One troubling instance involved the OAWP initiating an investigation that could itself be considered retaliatory. At the request of a senior leader who had social ties to the OAWP Executive Director, the OAWP investigated a whistleblower who had a complaint pending against the senior leader. After a truncated investigation, the OAWP substantiated the allegations without even interviewing the whistleblower.

In addition, former OAWP leaders made comments and took actions that reflected a lack of respect for individuals they deemed “career” whistleblowers. Moreover, at a time when the office was failing to meet its statutory requirements and purposes, then Executive Director Nicholas directed about 15 percent of the OAWP’s FY 2018 budget to be obligated for contracts beyond its core mission.

The new office was charged with investigating "all allegations and concerns." This tagline was featured on its website, sending the public the message that it was serious about its job. It wasn't.

From June 23, 2017, to December 31, 2018, the OAWP Triage Division received at least 3,694 submissions. Of these, only 547 were referred by the Triage Division to the Investigations Division… The OAWP’s advertised mission of investigating “all allegations and concerns” was not consistent with its practices…

The OAWP also failed to forward complaints it was specifically instructed to forward to the Inspector General. These complaints that never reached the OIG included those dealing with abuses of authority and/or criminal violations. When accountability is the goal -- as would seem to be the point of the Executive Order creating this office -- it would make sense to put as many eyes on big issues like this. That didn't happen either. The Inspector General singles out one case of several it never saw until it opened its own investigation of the OAWP.

In April 2018, the OAWP received allegations that a Covered Executive was engaging in contracting abuse, conflicts of interest, and violations of federal ethics rules. Some of these matters included alleged abuses of authority and/or potential felony criminal violations. These allegations were bundled with several others that included whistleblower retaliation and issues within OAWP’s scope. The OIG could locate no records in OAWP’s or OIG’s databases indicating that the contracting abuse, conflict of interest, and ethics allegations had been referred to the OIG despite possibly involving felony violations of federal laws on receiving gifts, making false statements, or other related crimes.

The whole thing is a mess. Whatever's not being undercut by unclear policies or retaliatory actions is being rendered useless by the general ineptness of this additional layer of bureaucracy.

The OAWP lacks comprehensive policies and procedures suitable for its personnel. This is particularly important given that individuals’ reputations are at stake, whistleblowers’ identities must be protected, and the issues on which the OAWP is reporting affect veterans’ lives in tremendously significant ways. Staff are either missing guidance or are piecing together direction largely based on the mandates of a prior office not entirely aligned with OAWP’s legislative scope.

The absence of quality control measures is particularly troubling given the hodgepodge of policies and procedures. Depending on disciplinary officials and VA’s Office of General Counsel to identify OAWP’s investigatory inadequacies cannot be a sustainable solution to effective oversight.

This hodgepodge extends to training and staffing. It all adds up to the VA understanding at some level that its survival depends on it not understanding this directive. Failing at multiple levels keeps complaints from rising to a level where the VA and OAWP might feel compelled to take action. And it was successful -- at least up until the IG completed its investigation -- to keep this chaotic charade off the radar of legislators.

This effort may have been Trump's nod to his promises to "drain the swamp." But this office sank into the swamp almost immediately after its creation in April 2017.

From July 2017 to November 2017, the OAWP received four submissions from four different individuals relating to allegations involving Peter Shelby, who was then serving as VA Assistant Secretary for Human Resources and Administration. The allegations included retaliation, harassment, discrimination, and creating a hostile work environment.

By the time the allegations were under OAWP review, Mr. Shelby had developed a personal relationship with Mr. O’Rourke (then the OAWP executive director) and Mr. Nicholas (then a senior advisor to the OAWP), which included golf outings and other social engagements.

Beyond social engagements, Mr. Shelby had influence over matters of importance to Mr. O’Rourke and Mr. Nicholas. For example, on September 19, 2017, Mr. Nicholas wrote to Mr. Shelby, “Please don’t forget to see about a waiver on my retired annuity. It is a fairly large sum of money for me . . .” Emails reflect that Mr. Nicholas pressed Mr. Shelby for assistance in obtaining the waiver through at least October 2017 and that the matter remained an open question through February 2018.

Email correspondence reflects that, as of March 9, 2018, the Investigations Director had completed the OAWP investigation and was drafting the report. The report was finalized on May 21, 2018, and it concluded that allegations against Mr. Shelby were not substantiated.

Trump actually tried to do the right thing. But this office was set up hurriedly and turned over to people who apparently had little desire to clean up the Department. The OAWP seems far more interested in burying whistleblowers and their reports. It appears to believe its job is to keep the boat from rocking, no matter how troubled the seas nor how agitated its passengers.

Filed Under: retaliation, va, whistleblower, whistleblowing

FBI Officially Has A Leak Investigation Unit

from the because-why-not dept

The Obama Administration was never a fan of leakers and whistleblowers. The Trump Administration isn't either. And it's continuing to ramp up investigations in response to a steady stream of leaks that tend to arrive moments after executive proclamations in order to undermine or contradict whatever has just been proclaimed.

Fired company man Jeff Sessions thought the best plan to tackle leaks was prosecuting the recipients: journalists. Not really the best plan of action in a country with enshrined speech rights, but that's the way things are being done in the nation's capital. True to form, the DOJ has gone after leakers with a vengeance, threatening to rewrite all of Obama's personal prosecution records.

The FBI is getting in on the action, according to a document obtained by Ken Klippenstein of The Young Turks. The word "espionage" is tossed around, but most of what the Trump Administration has dealt with has been embarrassing, rather than a concerted effort to hand secret documents over to our country's enemies. Nonetheless, hunting leakers is official FBI business.

"By law, the FBI is the lead federal agency responsible for the investigation of violations of the espionage laws of the United States,” one document, bearing the subheader “Functions and Mission Statement” reads.

“The complicated nature of — and rapid growth in — unauthorized disclosure and media leak threats and investigations has necessitated the establishment of a new Unit,” the document continues.

The file, dated November 10, 2017, is heavily redacted — as are the rest of the records provided to TYT. One document, dated May 24, 2018, shows that the Bureau’s Resource Analysis Unit approved a request by its Counterintelligence Division to establish a new cost code, apparently for the new leaks unit.

As Klippenstein notes, the obtained document [PDF] indicates Jeff Sessions was a man of words, rather than a man of action. The establishment of the unit -- meaning the point at which it started being funded -- didn't occur until May 2018. Sessions claimed in August 2017 the FBI already had a leak-fighting unit in place and that leak probes had already increased by 800%.

Sessions' leak-targeting premature ejaculation may have been meant to scare government employees into keeping the feds' secrets. If so, it wasn't too effective. The rate of leaks has slowed from "daily," but there's no shortage of insiders willing to spill dirt on the chaotic White House to journalists.

The government isn't opposed to leaks, per se. It just likes to ensure the narrative it wants to project makes its way to the public before the truth even gets its pants on. That hasn't worked for years, as the Obama Administration discovered prior to its war on leakers and whistleblowers. It's not going to work here either, but it does raise the odds the First Amendment is going to suffer for the sins our government fails to keep covered up.

Filed Under: doj, fbi, investigation, jeff sessions, leaks, retaliation, whistleblowers

Inspector General For Intelligence Community Buried Report Showing Whistleblower Retaliation

from the to-end-career,-blow-whistle dept

A report by Kevin Poulsen for The Daily Beast shows, once again, that those suggesting Ed Snowden should have used the proper channels to voice his concerns about domestic surveillance are either ignorant or deliberately obtuse.

Just prior to the Snowden leaks, President Obama enacted Presidential Policy Directive 19, which was supposed to prevent retaliation for whistleblowing. It was issued in 2012 and went into force just months before Snowden left the NSA with a trove of documents. However, it did not protect contractors like Snowden. Those protections were added by Congress years later. Not that it really matters. It has been well established those protections are mostly worthless.

Over the past year, there's been a concerted effort to oust Dan Meyer -- the person Intelligence Community whistleblowers are supposed to take their complaints to. Meyer filed his own whistleblowing complaint against the Defense Department, claiming IC officials retaliated against him for exposing waste and misuse of funds. Those gunning for top-level positions in Trump's Intelligence Community have histories of retaliatory behavior against whistleblowers, which would further cement the reputation of the "official channels" as a good way to jettison your career.

According to The Daily Beast, the problem is larger than previously thought. The implementation of PPD-19 hasn't changed anything. Whistleblowers are still facing retaliation or being ignored completely.

The investigators looked into 190 cases of alleged reprisal in six agencies, and uncovered a shocking pattern. In only one case out of the 190 did the agencies find in favor of the whistleblower—and that case took 742 days to complete. Other cases remained open longer. One complaint from 2010 was still waiting for a ruling. But the framework was remarkably consistent: Over and over and over again, intelligence inspectors ruled that the agency was in the right, and the whistleblowers were almost always wrong.

This damning report has never been presented to intelligence oversight nor to the general public. It was buried by the new head of the IC Inspector General's office.

The report was near completion following a six-month-long inspection run out of the Intelligence Community Inspector General office. It was aborted in April by the new acting head of the office, Wayne Stone, following the discovery that one of the inspectors was himself a whistleblower in the middle of a federal lawsuit against the CIA, according to former IC IG officials.

Stone also sequestered the mountain of documents and data produced in the inspection, the product of three staff-years of work. The incident was never publicly disclosed by the office, and escaped mention in the unclassified version of the IC IG’s semiannual report to Congress.

In essence, the IC has no independent oversight. That's not going to prevent whistleblowers from losing their jobs or security clearances. If the oversight is burying reports and withholding findings from its Congressional oversight, then there's really no reason whistleblowers should stick to the proper channels. If the IC wanted to shut down leaks, this was completely the wrong way to handle it. If careers are on the line, IC employees may as well take their complaints to the press, where they'll get heard, rather than to their supervisors or the Inspector General's office.

The numbers quoted in the Daily Beast's report show there's scant chance the Inspector General's office will be of any help to whistleblowers. Even if whistleblowers aren't suffering direct retaliation, the office's ability to "wait it out" prevents whistleblowers from escalating complaints further than the office uninterested in investigating complaints. To move forward, there must be some form of ruling or determination from the Inspector General. Without it, complainants have almost zero chance to seek other remedies, including suing agency officials for workplace retaliation.

The burial of this report by the Inspector General shows the official channels have suffered a perverse form of regulatory capture. The IG is no longer independent. It's owned and operated by the Intelligence Community, highly-deferential to officials who have nothing to gain if whistleblower complaints are sustained. It was arguably worse when Snowden left for Hong Kong. The bad news is it hasn't gotten any better over the last five years.

Filed Under: ed snowden, intelligence community, proper channels, retaliation, surveillance, whistleblowers

Defense Department Oversight Finds More Evidence Of Retaliation Against Whistleblowers

from the government-shutdown dept

More evidence has surfaced showing the US government really doesn't care for whistleblowers. A Defense Department Inspector General's report [PDF] obtained by MuckRock contains details of Air Force supervisors turning against a civilian employee who reported time card abuse.

The heavily redacted report, which MuckRock requested following on an announcement in the January newsletter of the Department of Defense Inspector General, found that the supervisor accused the whistleblower of being a mentally unstable drug abuser in addition to revoking his security clearance for the offense of reporting that colleagues were allowed to leave work hours early and lie on their time cards.

After that, things apparently became personal. (Well, they were already personal, what with supervisors accusing the whistleblower of being crazy/on drugs.) The relationship between the employee and his supervisors went from bad to worse to toxic. The report says "several verbal altercations" were noted as the work relationship became "mutually hostile."

The Air Force then pulled some more crap, resulting in another whistleblowing attempt by the same employee. When told not to perform an asbestos test before drilling into walls to install surveillance equipment, the employee bypassed the proper channels (which had already proven useless and retaliatory) and went straight to the Inspector General.

Having been notified of this, the IG dug deeper, uncovering the Air Force's vengeful tactics. In response to the employee's report to the IG, the Air Force supervisor doubled down on his "crazy drug user" claims -- the ones he used in support of having the employee suspended and his security clearances revoked.

The supervisor justified that suspension by telling IG investigators that his subordinate “had difficulty getting along with fellow employees, that employees were afraid of Complainant and locked the office door because of that fear and that he suspected Complainant was using drugs.”

Citation please.

[T]he Inspector General concluded that the supervisor “could not provide any evidence to support these allegations,” and that the clearance revocation was reprisal.

The statement given by the retaliatory supervisor to explain away the lack of documented evidence supporting his "crazy drug user" claims is a joy to read, filled with multiple layers of truly-terrible CYA logic.

When queried as to why he did not document these "bizarre" behaviors in either the December 22, 2011, or April 29, 2012, memo to support Complainant's suspension, [redacted] testified he had been "hamstrung" on documenting anything because Complainant grieved everything that was documented. [Redacted] further testified he believed his chain of command did not want documentation of these things for fear that there would be complaints filed by Complainant. [Redacted] testified he received no support from the Civilian Personnel Office or his chain of command when it came to dealing with Complainant. [Redacted] testified [redacted] told him [redacted] that he had handled the issues regarding Complainant correctly; but he was going to order a CDI [Commander-Directed Investigation] to throw Complainant a bone and so, "maybe Complainant would not file a bunch of IG complaints."

That seems to have worked out well.

Not every whistleblower ends up without a career or investigated by the agency they work for, but far too many face this sort of response when calling out government wrongdoing. Efforts have been made to shore up protections for whistleblowers, but it's illustrative of where these efforts fall short to note that this employee -- a civilian -- would not have been protected by federal whistleblower laws. Perhaps that's why Air Force supervisors felt so comfortable acting in retaliation. The government routinely uses civilian contractors and is under no statutory obligation to behave any better when dealing with their whistleblowing than the Air Force did here.

Filed Under: defense department, dod, inspector general, nsa, proper channels, retaliation, whistleblowers