A top Republican senator demanded a deeper explanation from President Trump about his removal of the State Department watchdog while criticizing the ousted inspector general over a flawed investigation into British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s dossier.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Finance Committee with a long-standing reputation for defending inspectors general, said Trump’s stated reasons for tossing State Department Inspector General Steve Linick on Friday were unsatisfactory even if the Iowa Republican himself had problems with the watchdog’s inquiry into the role the State Department played in the Trump-Russia saga.
“Here again, inspectors general are crucial in correcting government failures and promoting the accountability that the American people deserve,” Grassley said on Saturday. “Although he failed to fully evaluate the State Department’s role in advancing the debunked Russian collusion investigation, those shortcomings do not waive the President’s responsibility to provide details to Congress when removing an IG. As I’ve said before, Congress requires written reasons justifying an IG’s removal. A general lack of confidence simply is not sufficient detail to satisfy Congress.”
Grassley, along with Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, sent a two-page letter to Linick in September, questioning the watchdog’s decision-making in his inquiry into a key October 2016 meeting between Steele and top State Department officials. Grassley and Johnson pointed to Linick’s failure to talk to former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Kavalec, who took notes, and former Special Envoy Jonathan Winer, who organized the meeting. Linick also did not speak with former Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who received Steele’s meeting request and who Kavalec believed Steele wanted to meet with in his broader effort to disseminate the dossier’s findings. Kavalec knew by October 2016 that portions of Steele’s dossier were inaccurate, and Winer and Nuland were involved in spreading Steele’s information within the U.S. government.
The Republican senators said their staffs were briefed by Linick and learned the watchdog reviewed whether State Department employees violated the Hatch Act and whether Winer broke classified information protocols.
“The briefing also disclosed that the [inspector general] determined that a State Department employee may have engaged in anti-Trump political conduct in violation of the Hatch Act and referred that individual to the Office of Special Counsel for investigation,” Johnson and Grassley wrote. “Despite this recommendation, however, the [inspector general] did not publish a written report about its review.”
A Republican Senate staffer told the Washington Examiner on Saturday that Linick followed up on the September letter by providing another briefing, and said, “The explanation we received was that state IG was deferring to DOJ IG — but some of the characters involved were in State’s jurisdiction.”
DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz said in his December report on the FBI’s Russia investigation that two witnesses, Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson and Winer, both “declined our requests for voluntary interviews, and we were unable to compel their testimony.”
Horowitz criticized the Justice Department and the FBI for at least 17 “significant errors and omissions” related to Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrants against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and for the bureau’s reliance on Steele’s flawed dossier. Declassified footnotes show the FBI knew Steele’s dossier might have been compromised by Russian disinformation.
Linick’s abrupt removal on Friday, which is effective within 30 days, was troubling to another Republican: Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah. “The firings of multiple Inspectors General is unprecedented; doing so without good cause chills the independence essential to their purpose,” he tweeted Saturday.
Democratic House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel of New York and Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey announced an investigation into Linick’s firing, requesting all records about Linick’s firing from the White House, the State Department, and the State Department Office of the Inspector General by next Friday.
“President Trump’s unprecedented removal of Inspector General Linick is only his latest sacking of an inspector general, our government’s key independent watchdogs, from a federal agency,” they said. “We unalterably oppose the politically-motivated firing of inspectors general and the President’s gutting of these critical positions.”
Engel has said that he learned the Office of the Inspector General had opened an investigation into Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
“Reports indicate that Secretary Pompeo personally made the recommendation to fire Mr. Linick, and it is our understanding that he did so because the Inspector General had opened an investigation into wrongdoing by Secretary Pompeo himself,” Engel and Menendez said. “Such an action, transparently designed to protect Secretary Pompeo from personal accountability, would undermine the foundation of our democratic institutions and may be an illegal act of retaliation.”
Trump’s letter to Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stated that “it is vital that I have the fullest confidence” in those serving as inspector general and “that is no longer the case” with Linick. A White House official told the Washington Examiner on Saturday that “Secretary Pompeo recommended the move, and President Trump agreed.”
In April, the president removed the intelligence community watchdog, Michael Atkinson, who had handled the whistleblower complaint that led to Trump’s impeachment. He also got rid of Glenn Fine, the acting inspector general of the Defense Department, charged with overseeing the implementation of the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief package. In May, Christi Grimm, the acting inspector general for Health and Human Services, was demoted back to principal deputy watchdog. Grimm released an April report detailing “severe” and “widespread” shortages at hospitals in the early days of the outbreak.
