Dems to probe Trump ouster of watchdog
Dismissal drew ire of even Republicans
WASHINGTON: Congressional Democrats on Saturday launched a probe into President Donald Trump’s “politicallymotivated” dismissal of a government watchdog believed to have been investigating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The announcement came after Mr Trump told House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi late on Friday that he planned to dismiss State Department Inspector Gen Steve Linick.
It was Mr Trump’s third abrupt dismissal of an official monitoring governmental misconduct and abuse since April, and drew criticism even from members of his own party.
“The firings of multiple Inspectors General is unprecedented; doing so without good cause chills the independence essential to their purpose,” tweeted Republican Mitt Romney.
“It is a threat to accountable democracy and a fissure in the constitutional balance of power,” Mr Romney said.
Two senior Democrats — Sen Bob Menendez and congressman Eliot Engel — said they “unalterably oppose the politically-motivated firing”.
The lawmakers said Mr Linick had apparently “opened an investigation into wrongdoing by Secretary Pompeo himself ”, and said the firing was “transparently designed to protect Secretary Pompeo from personal accountability ... and may be an illegal act of retaliation”.
A Democratic congressional aide said Mr Linick was probing complaints that Mr Pompeo inappropriately used a political appointee to perform personal tasks for himself and his wife Susan.
CNN, citing a senior State Department official, said Mr Pompeo himself had recommended the firing and handpicked Stephen Akard, a former aide to Vice President Mike Pence, to succeed Mr Linick.
By law, the administration must give Congress 30 days’ notice of its plans to terminate an inspector general, in theory giving lawmakers time to study the move — and protest if warranted.
“A general lack of confidence simply is not sufficient detail to satisfy Congress,” warned Republican senator Chuck Grassley.
But previous such firings have gone through unimpeded, and those dismissed have been replaced by political allies of the Republican president.
Mr Engel, who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Sen Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, asked that the White House and State Department turn over records related to Mr Linick’s dismissal.
They also asked to see files for IG investigations “involving the Office of the Secretary that were open, pending, or incomplete at the time of Mr Linick’s firing”.
Mr Pompeo has raised eyebrows for frequently travelling the world on his government plane with his wife, who has no official role.
CNN reported last year that a whistleblower had complained that the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, which guards US missions overseas as well as the secretary of state, had been assigned questionable tasks for the Pompeos, such as picking up takeout food or tending to the family dog.
The State Department confirmed Mr Linick’s firing but did not comment on the reason or say whether he was looking into Mr Pompeo’s conduct.
A State Department spokeswoman also confirmed the new inspector general would be Mr Akard, an attorney who served as a foreign affairs adviser to Mr Pence when the latter was governor of Indiana.
Mr Pompeo is one of Mr Trump’s most trusted aides — and a rare one never to come publicly into the crosshairs of the mercurial president.
In recent months, Mr Pompeo has moved US foreign policy forcefully to the right — encouraging a drone strike that killed a top Iranian general and promoting a theory, discounted by mainstream scientists, that the Covid19 pandemic originated in a Chinese laboratory.