Tag: “only the best people”

Pompeo on IG firing: ‘Frankly should have done it some time ago’

The Hill logoSecretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday doubled down on his request to fire the State Department’s internal watchdog, while also refusing to detail his reason for recommending the move.

“Frankly should have done it some time ago,” Pompeo said during a combative briefing with reporters at the State Department, referring to his request.

President Trump notified Congress late Friday evening of his intention to dismiss State Department Inspector General (IG) Steve Linick, who was appointed in 2013 under President Obama, because he had lost confidence in the watchdog. Continue reading.

John Ratcliffe, Trump’s pick for top intelligence post, clears divided Senate panel

Washington Post logoTexas congressman John Ratcliffe (R) took a step closer to becoming President Trump’s top intelligence adviser on Tuesday, after the Senate Intelligence Committee voted along party lines to move his nomination to the full Senate.

Committee members voted 8 to 7 in favor of Ratcliffe as the next director of national intelligence, following an extraordinary hearing earlier this month held under social distancing guidelines. Ratcliffe sat far back from masked senators who questioned him on his credentials and whether he was capable of acting independently of his political allegiance to the president.

The committee vote was held behind closed doors in a secure facility in the Capitol. Ratcliffe is expected to be confirmed by the full Senate in a vote likely to be held after Memorial Day, according to congressional aides. Continue reading.

New report reveals Ukrainian charges against Paul Manafort were abruptly halted last year

AlterNet logoMuch has been written about Paul Manafort’s legal problems in the United States, where President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager was sentenced to seven and one-half years in federal prison after being convicted of crimes ranging from witness tampering to tax and bank fraud. But BuzzFeed reporters Tanya Kozyreva and Christopher Miller revealed on Friday that Manafort was also targeted by prosecutors in Ukraine.

“BuzzFeed News can now reveal that in May 2019, as Manafort settled into his U.S. prison cell, a special investigations unit inside the Ukrainian prosecutor general’s office was preparing to wrap up a four-year-long investigation — drafting an indictment for him as well as for Greg Craig, a former Obama White House counsel and partner at the big-shot law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom,” report Kozyreva and Miller, both of whom are based in Kyiv, Ukraine.

The alleged crime in question, according to the BuzzFeed journalists, was embezzling government funds. BuzzFeed has obtained a copy of the Ukrainian indictment, which alleges, “The managing partner of Skadden Law Firm, Gregory B. Craig, and Paul Manafort intentionally participated in the misappropriation of the funds from the State Budget of Ukraine totaling $1,075,381.41 —  8,595,523.61 Ukrainian hryvnias and more than 600 times the tax-free minimum of citizens’ salaries — causing damage to the state.” Continue reading.

Top intelligence nominee Ratcliffe faces lingering questions about qualifications, adherence to law

First Senate hearing since pandemic-related restrictions took effect

Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard M. Burr opened Tuesday morning’s confirmation hearing for Rep. John Ratcliffe to lead the intelligence community with a nod to the unusual circumstances.

“This hearing will be a little bit different. It is perhaps the first congressional hearing held during the extenuating circumstances of the pandemic,” the North Carolina Republican said. “We have a sparse crowd and an expanded dais, reflective of the committee’s adherence to the guidelines put forth by the Rules Committee and the attending physician.”

Indeed, the traditionally bipartisan Intelligence Committee had the dubious duty Tuesday of convening the first Senate hearing since coronavirus-related restrictions upended life on Capitol Hill. Continue reading.

Trump’s pick for Pentagon watchdog prompts questions

Jason Abend has no experience running a large organization, unlike many previous Pentagon IGs, and no military background

President Donald Trump moved swiftly this month to replace inspectors general across the government. Now Trump’s nominees for these watchdog jobs face questions about whether they will bark when needed, especially if Trump wants silence.

Arguably the most important IG organization in the country is the Pentagon’s, which comprises some 1,500 people in dozens of offices around the globe who do audits and criminal probes in search of waste, fraud or abuse in a nearly $700 billion annual enterprise.

Earlier this month, Trump pushed aside the Defense Department’s acting IG, Glenn Fine — the most experienced IG in history and one who was widely well-regarded — and moved him to the No. 2 Pentagon IG job. Continue reading.

Brett Giroir, Trump’s testing czar, was forced out of a job developing vaccine projects. Now he’s on the hot seat.

Washington Post logoBrett Giroir, the federal official overseeing coronavirus testing efforts, says that his experience working on vaccine development projects at Texas A&M University helped prepare him for this historic moment. He once said that his vaccine effort was so vital that “the fate of 50 million people will rely on us getting this done.”

But after eight years of work on several vaccine projects, Giroir was told in 2015 he had 30 minutes to resign or he would be fired. His annual performance evaluation at Texas A&M, the local newspaper reported, said he was “more interested in promoting yourself” than the health science center where he worked. He got low marks on being a “team player.”

Now President Trump has given Giroir the crucial task of ending the massive shortfall of tests for the novel coronavirus. Some governors have blasted the lack of federal help on testing, which they say is necessary to enact Trump’s plan for reopening the economy. Continue reading.

History repeats itself: Donald Trump tweets that John Ratcliffe will be director of national intelligence, again

Texas congressman was previously announced by Trump as his nominee for the position last July, before pulling back

Rep. John Ratcliffe is once again President Donald Trump’s choice to be director of national intelligence.

The president announced in a tweet Friday that he was nominating the Texas Republican, calling him “an outstanding man of great talent!”

This is not the first time Trump has tweeted that Ratcliffe would be nominated for the intelligence leadership post, which is currently occupied on an acting basis by U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell. Continue reading.

Betsy DeVos cornered by congressman for lacking basic information about the US education system: ‘You don’t know the answer?’

AlterNet logoSecretary of Education Betsy DeVos testified before a House Appropriations subcommittee Thursday and was repeatedly unable to answer basic questions, got snippy with Democratic lawmakers, and falsely claimed research cited by top Democrats was wrong and had been “debunked.”

(The numbers behind that research came from DeVos herself, according to this piece in the Washington Post.)

In an exchange with Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI), DeVos got heated, refuted his claims, and yet was unable to give a correct answer. Continue reading.

A new senior leader at the White House personnel office: A college senior

A new senior leader at the White House personnel office: A college senior

The White House has hired a college senior to be one of the top officials in its powerful Presidential Personnel Office, according to three administration officials familiar with the matter.

James Bacon, 23, is acting as one of the right-hand men to new PPO director John McEntee, according to the officials. Bacon, a senior at George Washington University pursuing a bachelor’s degree, comes from the Department of Transportation, where he briefly worked in the policy shop. Prior to that role, while still taking classes, he worked at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, where he was a White House liaison, according to two other officials. At HUD, he distinguished himself as Secretary Ben Carson’s confidential assistant, according to two other administration officials.

Bacon worked for McEntee on the Trump campaign’s earliest days and also did some work on the advance team. He later did operations on the Trump transition. Bacon would have graduated on time if he had not taken time off from school to work on the campaign, an official said. Continue reading.

Trump says he’s considering Rep. Douglas Collins for permanent DNI post; Collins says he doesn’t want it

Washington Post logoAIR FORCE ONE — President Trump told reporters Thursday evening that he was considering Rep. Douglas A. Collins (R-Ga.) as his permanent director of national intelligence — a move that Collins shot down a few hours later.

The move not only would fill a post that has not been permanently filled since Daniel Coats resigned last summer, but would help Trump and his fellow Republicans avoid what is already shaping up to be a messy intraparty fight for the Georgia Senate seat, where Collins is running against Sen. Kelly Loeffler in the party’s primary.

Collins is just one of several candidates he’s considering, said the president, who spoke to reporters as he flew from Colorado to Nevada as part of a four-day swing out West. Continue reading.