The IG house cleaning

Susan Crabtree:

For many of President Trump’s closest advisers and allies, the housecleaning is years overdue, while critics are aghast that he’s choosing to act in the middle of a pandemic.

Even as Trump and many high-profile members of his team are laser-focused on fighting the COVID-19 crisis, the White House is following through with a months-long plan to replace several administration inspectors general, part of the cadre of internal agency watchdogs who are supposed to serve as the first line of defense against government malfeasance and corruption.

During Tuesday’s daily coronavirus task force briefing, Trump implied that he no longer had faith in their oversight capabilities and he was in the process of replacing several of them.

“We have a lot IGs from the Obama era. … I left them largely” in place, he said. The president then openly complained about “reports of bias” surrounding some of their actions and acknowledged that he had moved to replace seven of them.

“We’re putting in seven names, I think it was seven, and they’re going in now,” he said.

Despite these watchdogs’ good-government mantra, many of Trump’s closest advisers and allies believe several inspectors general -- some serving in acting roles and first appointed during previous administrations -- have become a thorn in the side of his presidency, working to undermine his agenda and sabotage some political appointees’ efforts to carry it out.

The purge began last Friday when Trump ousted Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson and critics’ consternation erupted this week when they began realizing the moves’ full impact. Over the last week, Trump has made no secret about his distrust of the watchdogs, especially those appointed by Presidents Obama, George W. Bush or Clinton.

“We have a lot of IGs in from the Obama era. And, as you know, it’s a presidential decision,” Trump told reporters Monday, referring to presidents’ ability to remove the watchdogs and nominate new ones.

His beef with Atkinson (pictured) has been obvious. Trump has repeatedly blasted him for approving the whistleblower report objecting to his July 2019 telephone call with the president of Ukraine, which eventually launched the impeachment process.

Speculation that the president would fire Atkinson, one of his own appointees, has swirled since last fall when Trump began lashing out publicly, suggesting that Atkinson conspired with Democrats to green-light the whistleblower’s account.

Trump also has expressed distrust of FBI IG Michael Horowitz, accusing him in a mid-December tweet of overlooking agency bias in his final report on the way the FBI investigated alleged Trump campaign ties to Russia. Horowitz, who was appointed by Obama, remains in his post, although key Trump advisers would like to see him removed, knowledgeable sources tell RealClearPolitics.
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The IG system was so broken during Obama’s tenure that several top agency watchdogs were removed after congressional investigations into and accusations about their own malfeasance, including top watchdogs at the Department of Homeland Security and another at USAID.

In the most egregious case, Obama left a top inspector general position at the State Department vacant during Hillary Clinton’s entire tenure as secretary of state – including when she was sending emails using a private server.
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I wonder if the IG position at the State Department during the Obama administration was left empty at the request of Hillary Clinton.  That would have been consistent with her efforts to evade accountability by using a homebrew server to keep her emails from being reviewed by Congressional oversight.

I think The Trump administration has been given good reason not to trust deep state operatives put in place by the Obama administration. Many of them seem more intent on hobbling the Trump administration than doing the job of oversight of the bureaucrats.  Even Horowitz who uncovered significant misconduct by those in the DOIJ and FBI failed to deal with the obvious bias that was a result of the misconduct of those pushing the Russian collusion hoax.