https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/biden-is-firing-some-top-trump-holdovers-but-in-some-cases-his-hands-may-be-tied/ar-BB1d35B5?ocid=msedgntp
Biden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, 'his hands may be tied'
Lisa Rein, Anne Gearan 3 hrs ago
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^his hands 'may be tied'
kek
>https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/biden-is-firing-some-top-trump-holdovers-but-in-some-cases-his-hands-may-be-tied/ar-BB1d35B5?ocid=msedgntp
Biden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, 'his hands may be tied'
National Guard disputes rumor troops intentionally turned their backs on…
Media’s final slaps at Trump
The Washington Post logoBiden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, his hands may be tied
President Biden is trying to shake a Trump hangover in the federal government by acting to remove some holdovers and install his own appointees, but a quiet push to salt federal agencies with Trump loyalists is complicating the new president’s effort to turn the page.
The Biden team, showing a willingness to cut tenures short, moved quickly last week to dump several high-profile, Senate-confirmed Trump appointees whose terms extended beyond Inauguration Day — in some cases by several years.
They include the surgeon general, the National Labor Relations Board’s powerful general counsel, and the heads of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the U.S. Agency for Global Media.
But other, lower-profile Trump loyalists, some of whom helped carry out his administration’s most controversial policies, are now scattered throughout Biden’s government in permanent, senior positions. And identifying them, let alone dislodging them, could be difficult for the new leadership.
The Jan. 16 appointment of Michael Ellis, a former GOP operative who served in the Trump White House, as the National Security Agency’s top lawyer caused such a furor that he was placed on paid leave within hours of taking office.
And in the former president’s final months and weeks, dozens of other political appointees had their status similarly converted to permanent civil service roles that will allow them to stay in government for years to come. These new career officials are protected from partisan removal unless the new administration discovers that they got their jobs illegally — without competition and because of their political affiliation.
As Biden tries to reset the government to match his priorities, Democrats fear the Trump holdovers, who served in partisan roles, could undermine the new administration as they move into the civil service, which is supposed to operate free of partisanship.
The practice of shifting employees from appointee to career status, informally called burrowing, occurs at the end of every presidency — and it is controversial. Trump aides and their GOP allies in Congress, for example, threatened at the start of Trump’s term to remove any Obama-era political appointees who had been replanted in the civil service, and dozens were, records show.
cont
>Biden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, 'his hands may be tied' cont
But the just-departed president is on track to exceed the number of Democrats the Obama administration rewarded with permanent roles. In his final year, President Barack Obama moved 29 political appointees into career jobs. As of November, Trump had installed almost that many, 26, in the first 10 months of 2020, according to data provided to Congress by the Office of Personnel Management.
Nine more requests await review by personnel officials. More are expected. Congress has not received data covering December and the first 20 days of January, when outgoing administrations tend to move quickly to reward appointees who want to stay in government.
Burrowing is frowned upon by good-government groups — and by members of the party that is out of power — even when it is carried out legally, which means the appointee competed for the position and was the top candidate on the basis of merit and work experience, with no nod to political affiliation or loyalty.
The hiring of a political appointee for a career job must be scrutinized by the federal personnel office for five years after the person left the partisan job.
Such conversions also can violate civil service laws, as occurred during the George W. Bush administration, when a young Justice Department lawyer from the Republican National Committee, Monica Goodling, was found to have broken the law by using politics to guide hiring decisions for a range of critical jobs.
Goodling was granted immunity from prosecution in exchange for her testimony, and was reprimanded by the Virginia Bar. She acknowledged during a House hearing that she “crossed the line” and broke civil service hiring rules.
“There’s a great irony here,” said Rep. Gerald E. Connolly (D-Va.), who leads a House oversight panel on federal government operations, referring to Trump’s efforts to place his appointees in government. “The crowd that didn’t believe in government and called its agencies the deep state now wants to work for them.”
Connolly has asked the Government Accountability Office, Congress’s research arm, to tally all of Trump’s conversions over four years.–
Many of the new hires were not announced by their agencies, which may have presented a challenge for Biden’s transition teams to discover them.
“The incoming Biden-Harris administration is keenly aware of last minute efforts by the outgoing administration to convert political appointees into civil service positions,” a transition official said in a statement.
“We anticipate learning more in the weeks ahead as our work to restore trust and accountability across the federal government begins, including reviewing personnel actions during the Trump administration,” the official said.
Trump partisans now work in Biden’s government at a range of agencies, including the Justice Department, Homeland Security and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Many are serving in senior executive roles, the highest echelon of career leaders. They work as assistant U.S. attorneys, general counsel, intelligence leaders, immigration judges.
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>Biden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, 'his hands may be tied' cont
……….skippped some….it's a long read
–In other cases, Biden has sought to get rid of people installed by Trump in what the new president considers bad faith.
For example, Biden quickly forced out Michael Pack, the controversial head of the agency that oversees the Voice of America and four other networks that broadcast news to millions of people abroad, amid complaints of censorship and political interference by Pack. Biden also removed the VOA’s director and deputy director after they had been on the job only a few weeks, and the head of the Office of Cuba Broadcasting resigned.–
Andrew Saul, a Trump appointee whose six-year term as Social Security commissioner officially ends in 2025, had a curious new “acting” title on a list of temporary government leaders distributed by the new White House last week. Saul announced Thursday that several high-ranking deputies on his team, who had pushed for stricter eligibility for benefits, had been replaced — with labor-friendly Democrats. The Social Security Administration did not respond to a request for comment about the acting title.
In firing the National Labor Relations Board’s general counsel, Peter Robb, Biden broke with precedent to end the tenure of a figure seen as a foe by worker advocates and labor unions.
Robb had refused to resign when asked to do so just hours into the new presidency. The request was a departure from the norm that presidents of both parties have followed to allow the general counsel to serve out their term. Robb’s term was scheduled to run another 10 months.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked last week whether Biden is pursuing a political purge.
“That’s an individual who was not carrying out … the objectives of the NLRB, and so they were, they are, no longer in their position,” she said. “We’ll make those decisions as needed.”
anons, this article is interesting….Biden 'adm' really worried about all the moles Trump left in place …
you will have to go read it.
anon, you can only impeach the 'president' and we only have one president'
we have ex presidents
we have former presidents
we have future presidents.
so we only have one president, and we are told that priesident is Bidan.
so, if they impeach Trump, they are impeaching a private citizen, which means they can impeach and convict you or me or any private citizen…is that what you think is true?
Impeachment and conviction is to remove a sitting president.
they are trying to remove somebody who they believe is already removed….or is he?
>The Panama Canal Could Become the Center of the U.S.-China Trade War
^^^^^^^^^^^^notable plan for invasion
> impeach hussein when the time comes.
what would that do?
keep him from holding office again?
who care.
Hussein is going to be tried in some type of CRIMINAL COURT WITH REAL CONSEQUENCES
what result do you expect from impeaching obama at this stage?
>Why would anyone impeach Obama?
anon,
i am thinking there are shills here that think anons would be content with just impeaching these pedophile traitors….you know,…they really don't need to hang…just impeach
obama's in the house….trying to be impeached instead of executed as a traitor
then why do they already have tanks and troops in Mexico and Canada?