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Bush Admin Corruption
Officials
By Paul Kiel - December 31, 2007, 11:20AM
Boy, was it time for an update.
Late last year we decided to take stock of all the Bush
Administration officials who'd been accused of corruption
and/or resigned in the face of scandal. Although we had fun
doing it, we altruistically started the project in order to
help our friends at Powerline, who professed an inability to
think of any Bush officials beset by scandal.
This year´s result, which built on Justin Rood´s
original gem, is, like our catalog of the administration´s
efforts to disappear information, a staggering monument to
the Bush Administration. And it wouldn't have been possible
without TPM's research hounds, Adrianne Jeffries, Andrew
Berger, and Peter Sheehy.
A quick note on methodology. Since a complete catalog of
administration officials who've been accused of some form of
corruption or abuse of power would be endless, we tried to
maintain a high standard for inclusion. Most of those below
were the subjects of criminal probes, but we also included
officials who were credibly accused of acts that, if not
criminal, were a corruption of office (like the U.S.
attorney scandal). And even then, such officials were only
included if their accusers had them dead to rights (which is why
Karl Rove didn't make the cut). We also limited ourselves to
officials who were either political appointees or whose
actions were so political that they were effectively
political appointees (like John Tanner).
Enjoy:
Indicted / Convicted/ Pled Guilty
* Eric G. Andell - deputy undersecretary in charge of newly
created Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools (previously
senior adviser to Secretary of Education Rod Paige) -
pleaded guilty to one count of conflict of interest for using
government travel for personal causes and was sentenced to one
year of probation, 100 hours of community service, and
fined $5,000.
* Claude Allen - Assistant to the President for Domestic
Policy- resigned, pled guilty to shoplifting from Target
stores.
* Lester Crawford - Commissioner, FDA - resigned in late
September 2005 after only two months on the job. On October
17th, he pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts, making a
false writing and conflict of interest. On February 27,
2007, Crawford was sentenced to to three years of probation
and was fined $90,000.
* Brian Doyle - Deputy Press Secretary, Department of
Homeland Security - Resigned in wake of child sex scandal. Doyle
was arrested on April 4th, 2006 and pleaded no contest on
September 19, 2006 to seven counts of use of a computer to
seduce a child and sixteen counts of transmitting harmful
material to a minor. On November 17th, 2006 Brian Doyle was
sentenced to five years in state prison and ten years of
probation. He will also need to register as a sex offender.
* Steven Griles - Deputy Secretary at the Interior
Department - is the highest-ranked administration official yet
convicted in the Jack Abramoff scandal. In March 2007, Griles
pleaded guilty to lying about his role in the Jack Abramoff
scandal. Sentenced to 10 months incarceration.
* John T. Korsmo â Chairman of the Federal Housing Finance
Board from 2002 to 2004 â pleaded guilty in 2005 to lying
to the Senate and an inspector general. He swore he had no
idea how a list of presidents for FHFB-regulated banks
were invited to a fundraiser for his friend's congressional
campaign. On the invites, Korsmo was listed as the "Special
Guest." Got 18 months of probation and a $5,000 fine.
* Scooter Libby - Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of
staff - resigned after being indicted for lying to a grand
jury and investigators in connection with the investigation
stemming from the leak of Valerie Wilson's covert CIA
operative's identity. Convicted on four of five counts, making
him the highest-ranking White House official to be convicted
of a felony since the Iran-contra scandal. Sentenced to
thirty months imprisonment and a fine of $250,000. On July
2nd, after a judge decided that Libby would remain in prison
during the appeals process, President Bush commuted Libby's
sentence by removing the thirty months in prison.
* David Safavian - former head of the Office of Federal
Procurement Policy at the Office of Management and Budget -
convicted of lying to ethics officials and Senate
investigators about his ties to lobbyist Jack Abramoff. On October 27,
2006, he was sentenced to 18 months in prison. He is
currently appealing the ruling.
* Robert Stein - former comptroller and funding officer for
the now disbanded Coalition Provisional Authority,
Southern Central Region in Al-Hillah, Iraq - pleaded guilty to
conspiracy, bribery, conspiracy to commit money laundering,
possession of a machine gun, and being a felon in possession
of a fire arm. On January 30, 2007 Stein was sentenced to
nine years in prison and ordered to forfeit $3.6 million.
* Roger Stillwell - desk officer, Interior Department -
pleaded guilty to failing to report Redskins tickets and free
dinners from Jack Abramoff.
Resigned Due to Investigation, Pending Investigation or
Allegations of Impropriety
* Philip Cooney - chief of staff, White House Council on
Environmental Quality - a former oil industry lawyer with no
scientific expertise, Cooney resigned after it was revealed
he had watered down reports on global warming.
* George Deutsch - press aide, NASA - resigned amid
allegations he prevented the agency's top climate scientist from
speaking publicly about global warming.
* Michael Elston - chief of staff to Deputy Attorney
General Paul McNulty - announced his resignation on June 15,
2007. Despite allegations that he'd threatened at least four
of the eight fired US Attorneys, McNulty said Elston had
served the Justice Department "with distinction for nearly
eight years."
* Kyle Dustin "Dusty" Foggo - appointed executive
director of the CIA, the agency's third-highest post, in October
2004 - resigned and was ultimately indicted on bribery
charges related to the Duke Cunningham scandal.
* Alberto Gonzales - former Attorney General - resigned
without explanation amidst investigations of the firings of
U.S. Attorneys, the politicization of the Justice Department,
warrantless surveillance, and the torture and mistreatment
of detainees.
* Monica Goodling - former Justice Department liaison to
the White House and senior counsel to Attorney General
Alberto Gonzales - resigned on April 7, 2007 amidst the
investigation of the firings of U.S. Attorneys.
* Michelle Larson Korsmo - deputy chief of staff,
Department of Labor - Helped her husband (see John Korsmo, above)
with his donor scam. Quietly left her Labor plum job in
February 2004, about two weeks before news broke that she and
her husband were the targets of a criminal probe.
* Howard "Cookie" Krongard - former State Department
inspector general -- accused of not properly investigating State
Department contractor fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan; of
retaliating against whistle blowers in his own office; and of
not telling the truth about his knowledge of his brother's
ties with Blackwater, a State Department contractor. Faced
with a possible perjury investigation, Howard Krongard
resigned on December 7, 2007.
* Julie Macdonald - former deputy assistant secretary for
fish, wildlife and parks at the Interior Department -
resigned in May 2007 after an "inspector general's report found
she had improperly leaked information to private
organizations, bullied staff scientists and broken federal rules." The
Department of the Interior is investigating many of her
decisions regarding endangered species; so far seven have
been overturned.
* Paul McNulty - Deputy Attorney General for the Department
of Justice resigned, after questions about his
involvement in the U.S. attorney firings and his testimony to
Congress about the firings.
* Richard Perle - Chairman, Defense Policy Board - resigned
from Pentagon advisory panel amid conflict-of-interest
charges.
* Susan Ralston - assistant, White House - resigned amidst
revelations that she had accepted thousands of dollars in
gifts from Abramoff without compensating him, counter to
White House ethics rules.
* Janet Rehnquist - inspector general, Department of Health
and Human Services - resigned on June 1, 2003 in the face
of an investigation into her alleged efforts to block a
politically dangerous probe on behalf of the Bush family.
* James Roche - secretary, U.S. Air Force - resigned in the
wake of the Boeing tanker lease scandal, after it was
revealed he had rather crudely pushed for Boeing to win a $23
billion contract.
* Kyle Sampson -former chief of staff for Attorney General
Alberto Gonzales - resigned amidst the investigation of the
firings of U.S. Attorneys.
* Joseph Schmitz - Inspector General, Defense - Resigned
amid charges he personally intervened to protect top
political appointees.
* Bradley Schlozman - resigned from his third and final
post with the Justice Department after accusations of actively
politicizing the department. He's currently under
investigation by the Department's inspector general.
* Thomas Scully - Administrator, Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services - shortly after Scully resigned in 2003,
an investigation by the Department of Health and Human
Services inspector general found that Scully had pressured the
agency's actuary to underestimate the full cost of the
Medicare reform bill by approximately $100 billion until after
Congress passed the bill into law. Scully was also hit with
conflict of interest charges by the U.S. attorney's office
for billing CMS for expenses incurred during a job search
while he still headed the agency. He settled those charges
by paying $9,782.
* David Smith - deputy assistant secretary for fish,
wildlife, and parks, Interior Department - resigned on July 21,
2006 after shooting a buffalo and accepting its skeletal
remains and meat as an illegal gratuity. He eventually paid
over $3,000 for the dead buffalo, but only after the internal
inquiry had commenced. The Department of Interior
inspector general also noted in a May 16, 2006 report that Smith's
involvement in the designation of Houston as a port of
entry for imported wildlife in order to benefit a friend was
inappropriate.
* John Tanner - Voting Rights Section Chief, Justice
Department - resigned in December of 2007 and moved to the Office
of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair
Employment Practices. Already under suspicion for aiding efforts to
politicize the voting section, the bumbling proponent of
voter identification laws angered lawmakers with his
comments that such laws actually discriminate against white voters
because "minorities die first". Even more impressive was
his apology for the comment. The DoJ's Office of
Professional Responsibility is currently investigating his travel
habits and those of his deputy.
* Sara Taylor - Deputy Assistant to the President and
Director of Political Affairs at the White House, where she was
Karl Rove's top aide - resigned amidst the U.S.
attorneys investigation and other probes of Rove's alleged
politicization of the government.
* Ken Tomlinson - Board Chairman, Corporation for Public
Broadcasting; member, Broadcasting Board of Governors -
resigned at the release of an inspector general report
concluding he had broken laws in spending CPB money to hire
politically connected consultants to search for "bias" without
consulting the board. At BBG, a separate investigation found he
was running a "horse racing operation" out of his office,
and continuing to hire politically-wired individuals to do
"consulting" work for him. After being nominated and
serving another term, he finally stepped down from that spot
earlier this year.
* Carl Truscott - Director, Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and
Explosives Bureau - resigned. A report by the Justice
Department's inspector general found that Truscott wasted tens
of thousands of dollars on luxuries, wasted millions on
whimsical management decisions and violated ethics rules by
ordering employees to help his nephew with a high school video
project.
* Paul Wolfowitz - World Bank President - resigned in May
2007 after a committee report found that he broke ethics
rules by giving his girlfriend a substantial raise.
Nomination Failed Due to Scandal
* Linda Chavez - nominated, Secretary of Labor - withdrew
her nomination in January 2001 amidst revelations that an
illegal immigrant lived in her home and worked for her in the
early 1990s. Chavez blamed what she said were the
"search-and-destroy" politics of Washington.
* Timothy Flanigan - nominated, Deputy Attorney General
(also Alberto Gonzales' top deputy at the White House) -
withdrew his nomination in October 2005 amidst revelations that
he'd worked closely with lobbyist Jack Abramoff when he
was General Counsel for Corporate and International Law at
Tyco, which was a client of Abramoff's.
* Bernard Kerik - nominated, Secretary, Department of
Homeland Security - withdrew his nomination amidst a host of
corruption allegations. Eventually pleaded guilty to a
misdemeanor relating to improper gifts totaling tens of thousands
of dollars while he was a New York City official in the
late 1990's. Subsequently, on November 8, 2007, Kerik was
indicted on sixteen counts for bribery, tax fraud, and false
statements with a maximum sentence of 142 years and more than
$5 million in fines. Kerik has pleaded not guilty. For a
rundown of Kerik's myriad indiscretions, check out TPM's
Ultimate Kerik Scandal List!.
* William Mercer - the former associate deputy attorney
general and US Attorney for Montana - withdrew his nomination
to be the permanent number three official at the Department
of Justice on June 22, 2007 due to his role in the U.S.
attorney firings.
* Hans von Spakovsky - Commissioner, FEC - nomination to
another term after his recess appointment failed due to
allegations that he'd worked at the Justice Department to
suppress minority voter turnout.
Under Investigation But Still in Office
* Stuart Bowen - Special Inspector General for Iraq
Reconstruction (SIGIR) - was once admired for his successes while
investigating allegations of waste and fraud in Iraq, but
now employee allegations have prompted four government
investigations into the Office of the Special Inspector General
for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR).
* Lurita Doan - Administrator of the U.S. General Services
Administration - still in office, despite investigations by
both the Office of Special Counsel and the House oversight
committee that found that Doan had "crossed the line" by
suggesting that the GSA use its resources to help
Republicans get elected.
* Alfonso Jackson - Secretary of Housing and Urban
Development - following reports that Jackson told a business group
in April 2006 that he once canceled a contract after the
contractor criticized President Bush, an investigation by the
HUD inspector general found that while Jackson told his
deputies to favor Bush supporters, there was "no direct proof
that a contract was actually awarded or rescinded because
of political affiliation." A second, criminal investigation
was triggered in part by Jackson's claim before Congress
in May 2007 that "I don't touch contracts." That probe, now
before a federal grand jury, has turned up evidence that
Jackson may indeed have touched contracts - and steered them
towards friends.
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