The former head of an independent watchdog said the decision of the Donald Trump administration to fire all people in similar positions has no precedent in over 40 years and poses a threat to government oversight.
Speaking to CBS News, Hampton Dellinger, who led the Office of Special Counsel, detailed that “the independent watchdogs who are working on behalf of the American taxpayers, on behalf of military veterans,” have been “pushed out.”
Trump has also removed the Office of Government Ethics director, as well as 17 inspectors general and auditors. “I don’t think we have watchdog agencies anymore,” Dellinger added.
The only time when a similar move took place was in 1981, when then President Ronald Reagan fired all 15 watchdogs serving in the newly-created posts because he wanted to have “the fullest confidence” in each one of them. He ended up rehiring a third after getting pushback from Congress.
Dellinger is a Democrat and was appointed by former President Joe Biden, but he claimed that his role is not partisan and he filed cases against the former administration “time, and time, and time again.”
The former official highlighted that his firing, which took place via email, is “just flatly inconsistent with the law,” which requires a president give Congress 30 days notice before such a move and provide “substantive rationale, including detailed and case-specific reasons” for the termination.”
“They didn’t have a very good reason. They had no reason,” Dellinger claimed. He sued to keep his job and got a federal court to grant his request, but ended giving up after an appeals court sided with the Trump administration’s decision to remove him. Dellinger said taking the matter to the Supreme Court would take a long time and by then the office would already be gutted.
“This new ruling means that OSC will be run by someone totally beholden to the president for the months that would pass before I could get a final decision from the U.S. Supreme Court,” Dellinger told the outlet.
The official had continued taking actions under his role while the battle was ongoing, including challenging the mass firing of more than 5,000 probationary governmentemployees. On Friday, Dellinger filed a petition with the Merit Systems Protection Board, arguing that the Department of Agriculture’s mass firing of more than 5,000 probationary employees violated federal civil-service protections.
Originally published on Latin Times
