Watchdogs -- Never more needed, or endangered -- May 21, 2020 column

By MARSHA MERCER

An inspector general investigates wrongdoing by the head of a federal department who’s also a staunch presidential ally.

Boom! The president fires the inspector general. What now?

Sounds like a plot of a Netflix drama, but that’s roughly what happened last Friday night, when President Donald Trump fired Steve Linick, the State Department inspector general.

Linick, it seems, ran afoul of his boss by doing his job. Inspectors general are independent watchdogs inside federal departments and agencies who investigate corruption, misconduct and misuse of federal funds. 

Linick reportedly had launched an investigation into Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s use of agency staff for personal chores and into an $8 billion U.S. arms sale to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates without the approval of Congress.

Trump said he fired Linick because Pompeo asked him to do so. Pompeo said he didn’t know Linick was investigating him or the arms sale.

Linick was the fourth inspector general in six weeks Trump fired on a Friday night when most Americans were focused on the coronavirus pandemic and the economic meltdown.

Trump on May 1 said he was naming a new inspector general at Health and Human Service, moving aside Christi Grimm, the principal deputy inspector general.

Her office had issued a report about problems in 300 hospitals nationwide that were struggling without adequate equipment to respond to COVID-19, the deadly disease caused by the novel coronavirus – while Trump was bragging hospitals had everything they needed.

In April, Trump said he was replacing Glenn Fine, acting inspector general at Defense. The move means Fine is ineligible to lead a new panel charged with oversight of the trillions of dollars in pandemic relief funds recently approved by Congress.

Also in April, Trump fired Michael Atkinson, Trump’s own appointee as inspector general of the intelligence community. Atkinson had told Congress about the whistleblower complaint that led to Trump’s impeachment.

Trump says he lacked confidence in the inspectors general, but his Friday night massacres raise a larger question: What does his administration have to hide?

The firings also send a clear message to the dozens of IGs stationed around the federal government: To keep your job, avoid annoying the boss.

But we don’t have a king. The Constitution creates three equal branches of government, with checks and balances. All Americans, regardless of party, should demand inspectors general be protected so they can do their work on our behalf.  

In the wake of Watergate, Congress passed the Inspector General Act of 1978, authorizing a system of independent auditors and investigators to uncover and report on corruption in the federal bureaucracy.

Under the law, the president chooses and the Senate confirms inspectors “without regard to political affiliation and solely on the basis of integrity and demonstrated ability in accounting” and other financial specialties.

Of course, no president likes inspectors snooping around, but Trump said Monday, “Every president has gotten rid of probably more [inspector generals] than I have.” That’s wrong.

When Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, he quickly tried to clean house of inspectors general. After a bipartisan uproar, though, he re-nominated five of the 15 he had fired, according to a new Congressional Research Service report.

A handful of other inspectors may have quit to avoid firing, the research service said in the May 12 report, but since 2000 only one president had fired any.

In 2009, President Barack Obama fired Gerald Walpin, IG of the Corporation for National Community Service, after Walpin investigated how grant money was used at a school in California run by former NBA basketball player Kevin Johnson. Johnson was a supporter of Obama and mayor of Sacramento.

“No one seemed to care” when Obama did the firing, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany complained this week. That’s also wrong. The Obama firing led to a bipartisan congressional effort to tighten rules on firing inspectors general. It failed.

At a time when inspectors general have never been more needed, or endangered, Trump would happily get rid of more.

And so we see a familiar pattern. Congressional Democrats raise alarms while almost all congressional Republicans sit silent.

If Congress won’t stop Trump from weakening watchdogs, the voters must remember come November.

©2020 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

House Democrats shift focus to Trump corruption -- Sept. 19, 2019 column

By MARSHA MERCER

The drive to impeach President Donald Trump is taking a turn. It’s emoluments time.

The House Judiciary Committee plans to meet Monday to investigate “Presidential Corruption: Emoluments and Profiting off the Presidency.”

This new tack comes with risk. Despite spending five months parsing special counsel Robert Mueller’s report about Russian influence in the 2016 campaign, House Democrats have not made their case for Trump’s impeachment to the public.

Only 37 percent of voters want Congress to begin impeachment proceedings, a Politico/Morning Consult poll released Wednesday found. Half of voters were opposed and 12 percent undecided.

Support is highest among the Democratic base but weak among independent voters, who the Democratic presidential nominee will need in 2020.   

House Democrats who back impeachment believe exposing Trump’s self-dealing – using his office for personal gain -- will gin up enough public support so lawmakers in districts Trump won will vote for impeachment.

Air Force flight crews have stayed at Turnberry, Trump’s resort in Scotland, on stopovers from the United States to the Middle East. Vice President Mike Pence stayed at Doonbeg, Trump’s resort in Ireland, even though it was across the country from his meetings in Dublin.

Trump touted his Doral golf resort in Miami for next year’s meeting of the Group of Seven world leaders.

“The public is starting to get the point that he’s been running the White House as a money-making operation for himself and his family,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., a member of the Judiciary Committee, told NBC’s Chuck Todd.

Trump’s presidency has introduced Americans to the Constitution’s three anti-corruption measures, the Emoluments Clauses.

The Framers used emolument to mean a benefit, gain, profit or advantage. At that time, foreign governments often gave lavish tokens of appreciation and friendship to diplomats, and the Framers wanted to limit foreign influence.

The Foreign Emoluments Clause in Article 1, Section 9 prohibits any person holding an “Office of Profit or Trust” from accepting “without the Consent of the Congress. . . any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind, whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”

The two other Emolument Clauses concern domestic issues.    

There’s significant debate among legal scholars about what constitutes an emolument and whether elected officials, including the president, are covered by the clause, the Congressional Research Service said in a report last month.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel has presumed the president is covered, and courts have come to the same conclusion, the report said. But there have been no definitive court decisions.

When President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, he donated the $1.4 million prize money to charity.

Trump refused to put his business holdings in a blind trust, as presidents for the last 40 years have done. He set up a trust run by his sons and a Trump organization executive and said he wouldn’t talk business with his family.

Trump also said he would not profit from foreign governments that use his hotels. He has donated about $351,000 to the U.S. Treasury to cover the profits, but as he has neither disclosed his record-keeping nor how he calculated the amount, Democrats say the figure is much too low.

Three major lawsuits claiming Trump violated the Emoluments Clauses are bouncing around federal courts, but the pace of justice is slow. Trump claims he is losing money as president, largely because of his legal bills to defend himself in the lawsuits.

“It’s probably costing me from $3 to $5 billion for the privilege of being – and I couldn’t care less – I don’t care. You know if you’re wealthy, it doesn’t matter,” he said last month.  

Again, Trump refuses to provide any documentation to back up his claims.

He also complained nobody investigated Obama’s lucrative book deal.  The former president and first lady Michelle Obama signed a joint book deal for $65 million in 2017 – after he left office.

“I got sued on a thing called ‘emoluments,’” Trump said.

Trump created his problems for himself by refusing to follow established presidential norms like blind trusts and disclosure of tax returns. Democrats smell smoke, but they must find the fire to make the case.

©2019 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

30

Time to scrap Selective Service System -- Feb. 28, 2019 column

By MARSHA MERCER

Few may have noticed when a federal judge ruled that requiring only men, and not women, to register for the draft is unconstitutional now that all military jobs are open to women.

“While historical restrictions on women in the military may have justified past discrimination, men and women are now ‘similarly situated for purposes of a draft or registration for a draft,’” U.S. District Judge Gray H. Miller wrote.

The ruling issued Friday in Houston doesn’t change anything, but it does raise a larger question: Why should anyone – male or female -- have to register for the draft in 2019?

The last man was drafted into military service in 1973. And yet today, male citizens and residents of the United States ages 18 through 25, including documented and undocumented immigrants, still must register for the draft – or risk fines and prison time. On paper, anyway.

No one has been prosecuted for failing to register since 1986, the Congressional Research Service reported in January in a study of selective service and the draft issues for Congress.

Many young men register for the draft automatically when they get their driver’s license or apply for federal student aid. 

The Selective Service System -- 124 full-time employees “complemented with a corps of volunteers and military reservists” -- keeps a database in a Chicago suburb with 78 million records, CRS reported.

The data – names, addresses, Social Security numbers -- are retained until a registrant turns 85 – yes, 85! -- in case the information is needed to certify someone is eligible for federal student aid, training, government jobs and security clearances.

The Selective Service annual budget of nearly $23 million is peanuts by federal standards, but it’s wasteful to spend even that much on an unused and unneeded agency. The rationale that we might need to mobilize manpower quickly with a draft is antiquated in the age of modern warfare, critics say.

And the Pentagon?

“We don’t want a draft,” then-Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, who opened all military jobs to women in 2015, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2016.

“We don’t want people chosen for us. We want to pick people. That’s what the all-volunteer force is all about. That’s why the all-volunteer force is so excellent,” Carter said.

The Trump administration hasn’t taken a stand, but Congress has wrestled for decades with the Selective Service System and the draft. It finally punted.   

Congress created the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service in 2017 to come up with recommendations. As the name suggests, the commission is charged with finding ways to weave various kinds of service into the fabric of American life.

The commission spent last year listening to people across the country and has more hearings scheduled. A final report and recommendations are due to Congress in March 2020. Read more at www.inspire2serve.gov.

“Our conversations underscored that while service is encouraged by many families, schools and communities, there is no widely held expectation of service in the United States,” commission Chairman Joe Heck, former Republican congressman from Nevada, a physician and brigadier general in the Army Reserves, wrote in an Interim Report in January.

“As a result, military, national and public service is the exception rather than the rule,” he wrote.

While many agree that shared voluntary service for young people especially is a worthy goal, the report laid out challenges.

Whether someone wants to join the military or not, it’s a national disgrace that only about 30 percent of 17- to 24-year-olds meet the physical, mental and moral requirements for the military.

The Army failed to reach its recruiting goal last year for the first time since 2005, partly because fewer young people even think of joining the military.

As for national service, few Americans know about the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, Senior Corps and Teach for America, the report said.

So, if the Selective Service System is a dinosaur – and it is – let’s scrap it and dedicate our resources to making voluntary service a shared expectation.

Let’s return to a time-tested, 20^th century ideal: “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” That would make America truly great.

©2019 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

Smarter than a congressman? Test yourself on foreign aid -- March 9, 2017 column

By MARSHA MERCER

President Donald Trump’s budget for the fiscal year that begins in October likely will include a $54 billion hike in defense spending and drastic cuts in the State Department and foreign aid to pay for it.

But it’s far from a sure thing. The president’s budget is a proposal or starting point. Congress has the final word and will begin work on the budget later this month.

Americans believe we spend too much on foreign aid, polls show, although people have misconceptions about what’s called “soft power” – humanitarian relief, economic development and anti-poverty programs, among others.

Think you know foreign aid? Before the debate begins, test your smarts with our 10-question quiz. Answers are below. Good luck! 

1)    How much of the federal budget goes to foreign aid?

A.   31 percent

B.   26 percent

C.   15 percent

D.   1 percent

2)    Roughly how much will the United States spend this year on foreign assistance?

A.   $100.5 billion

B.   $75 billion

C.   $36.5 billion

D.   $20 million

3)    How many countries around the world receive U.S. foreign aid?

A.   50

B.   75

C.   More than 100

D.   More than 200

4)    Which country receives the most foreign assistance from the United States?

A.   Iraq

B.   Afghanistan

C.   Egypt

D.   Israel

5)    The United States provides more foreign aid than any other nation. How much of the world’s development assistance comes from the United States?

A.   24 percent

B.   30 percent

C.   50 percent

D.   65 percent

6)    The United States hasn’t always been the No. 1 donor. Which country provided more foreign aid between the years of 1989 and 2001?

A.   United Arab Emirates

B.   Japan

C.   Saudi Arabia

D.   Qatar

7)    Where does the money go? Pick the largest program category.  

A.   Peace and security  

B.   Humanitarian assistance   

C.   Health

D.   Economic development

8)    Where else? Which of these smaller categories distributes the most money?

A.   Environment  

B.   Education and social services

C.   Democracy, human rights and governance

9)    The State Department and USAID are two of the federal agencies involved in foreign aid. How many agencies in total provide foreign assistance?

A.   10  

B.   20

C.   25

10)           Name that tweeter: “Foreign aid is not charity. We must make sure it is well spent, but it is less than 1% of budget & critical to our national security.”

A.   Hillary Clinton

B.   Marco Rubio

C.   Barack Obama

D.   Mitt Romney

ANSWERS:

1       1)    D.  Foreign assistance was 1.3 percent of federal budget authority in fiscal 2015, the Congressional Research Service reported in June. Americans’ average guess is 31 percent, a Kaiser Family Foundation poll found last year. Only about three people in 100 knew foreign aid is about 1 percent.

2      2)    C. Tallies vary from $31.3 billion to $39.9 billion, depending on the kinds of assistance included and how the calculations are made, according to PolitiFact. The $36.5 billion figure comes from foreignassistance.gov, a federal site that collects data from federal agencies involved in foreign aid.

3     3)    C. Source: foreignassistance.gov

4     4)    D. Israel -- $3.1 billion this year, increasing to $3.8 billion after 2017, followed by Egypt, Afghanistan and Iraq. (foreignassistance.gov)

5     5)    A. 24 percent in 2014 (Congressional Research Service)

6     6)    B. Japan took the lead when foreign aid spending by the United States declined after the Cold War ended. United States spending rose after 9/11, surpassing Japan. (Congressional Research Service)

7     7)    C. Health at $9.3 billion in 2017, followed by Peace and Security at $8.3 billion, Humanitarian Assistance at $6.0 billion, and Economic Development at $3.7 billion (foreignassistance.gov)

8     8)    C. Democracy at $2.7 billion, followed by Environment at $1.3 billion and Education at $1.1 billion (foreignassistance.gov)

9     9)    B. These include the departments of Agriculture, Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury as well as such independent agencies as the Peace Corps and Millenium Challenge Corporation.

1     10)                       B. Sen. Rubio of Florida on Feb. 28, 2017.

For more, check out www.foreignassistance.gov