True Americans in the Government Continue to Stand Against Trump
You’ve probably heard about Trump politicizing the U.S. Agency for Global Media which manages Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and Radio Free Asia by installing loyalist Michael Pack. Pack has packed the board of the agency, as well as senior staff with other Trumpists, ideologues, and conservative activists. Biden has already signaled a housecleaning and fumigation of the agency when he takes over in a few weeks, but Pack is not planning on going quietly.
In secret, Pack has unilaterally attempted to execute binding employment contracts with said Trumpists intended to block any Biden firings for two years. When the career staff found out what Pack was doing, they said not no, but hell no, and blew the whistle. Day before yesterday, they sent a four page letter to McConnell, Pelosi, and Senate and House leaders, the Inspector General, and the presidential transition team. The letter was signed by over two dozen staffers including the editorial board, the editor in chief, and all the heads of the global regional operations. In the letter, they made this statement:
“These actions include your recent distribution of a revised grant agreement with RFE/RL that has been unilaterally prepared by your office and is intended to revoke RFE/RL’s financial autonomy and embed your appointees within both RFE/RL and its Board of Directors for a period of two years – an unprecedented departure from RFE/RL’s tradition of working in a bipartisan manner with changing U.S. administrations. This conflicts with the appointment process enshrined in law and in our bylaws, and is precisely the kind of political power maneuver that RFE/RL regularly witnesses in places like Russia, Hungary, Belarus, and Tajikistan. We never thought we’d see it from our own oversight agency.”
When Pack took over last June (after a two year Senate confirmation battle), he made sweeping changes to the agency including dissolving all of the boards of the agencies under his authority and packing the boards and staff with a rogue’s gallery of religious fanatics, activists, ideologues and weirdos. What’s particularly galling is that in October a Superior Court Judge in DC ruled that Pack had acted illegally in dissolving the board and seizing control of the Open Technology Fund which was established to help areas of the world access to open and secure internet access. Pack has ignored the court order and to reestablish the boards he dissolved.
Pack is a bad guy who represents all that is truly odious about Trump who is continually trying to destroy our democracy. Many thanks to those career staffers and true Americans who stood up to Pack and said NO.
They are the only thing right now standing between democracy and the Trump abyss.
Pack? As in packrat?
1According to the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank, Trump’s budget director Russell Vaught is apparently another person playing scorch earth politics.
2Sounds like Biden Administration is going to have to waste time getting the courts to declare such things illegal (which they are) in more than one agency to restore *appropriate* and *legal* leadership in them.
I’d been concerned about lower level “sleepers”….but this attempt to ‘”bind” an agency to Trump’s politics is worrying and unacceptable.
3One of Biden’s many “right off the bat” tasks is going to be the housecleaning and fumigating of SO MANY government agencies to rid them of the infestation of Trumpists. It’s going to take a long time to repair the damage that sorry excuse for a president has caused. Another job for Biden will be to push HARD for laws that prevent another president from doing what Trump attempted. Winning those two Senate seats in Georgia would be a huge boost toward that goal.
4And yet so many GOPs are still too cowardly to put their names to their comments. Like this one tweeted by Olivia Nuzzi that made me giggle. “As I just reported on @cnn with @JohnAvlon, a Republican official tells me that part of why establishment types are so angry with Josh Hawley is because they think he knows better. As the official put it: “He’s not some moron like Louie Gohmert.””
5President Biden is going to need an entire special task force devoted to rooting out trumpanzees at every level of the federal government. The Rethuglikans of the ‘Putin’s Puppet’ regime have had a long time to burrow in deep. They knew exactly what they were doing.
It will take time, effort, and resources to cleanse their filth away.
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Along the same line, it appears that some within the [formerly] most trusted and critical group in the federal government, the LEOs of the Secret Service, have had their allegiance compromised.
Some agents are being reassigned away from President-Elect Biden because their trustworthiness has come into question.
A Daily Kos analysis of a WaPo article:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/1/1/2005131/-Biden-s-Secret-Service-detail-to-include-trusted-agents-as-allies-express-concerns-about-others
6When I worked at the U.S. Department of Education, we got regular visits from attorneys from the legal beagle pound, checking to be sure any such shenanigans with boards, contracts, and everything else, was perfectly crafted within the law. This was in the Reagan administration.
We had a minor tussle when we put a lock on the door of the room with the computer that ran the national teachers’ bulletin board — computers had a habit of walking away. One of the lawyers threatened to call GSA and get a GSA cop to haul us away. We had prepared, and noted that the order was that we shirk our duty to protect hardware belonging to the department, as we handed them the phone.
I mention this to suggest that at some point I would expect FBI to raid this fellow’s office, and that he be carted out at the same time. The actions are not just contrary to the regulations, they violate all sorts of laws, including those against self-dealing. Felonies. Indefensible.
The letter from the two dozen staffers is a masterful piece of understatement, and too-quiet reserve. I think I’d have threatened violence, and I’m not a violence-threatening sort of guy.
7I really like the sound of President Biden and Vice President Harris. Enough of this “elect” prefix stuff. Seriously, they’re already steering the ship that has been ruder-less for 4 years.
8Pack deserves to have the book thrown at him for going against the judge’s order. Please!
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