[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 113 (Thursday, June 18, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3088-S3090]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                           Inspectors General

  Mr. GRASSLEY. In recent months, a lot of attention has focused on the 
Nation's inspectors general. It seems like a good idea to take a few 
minutes now to remember what inspectors general are, why Congress 
created them in the first place, and how we got here.
  Congress first established offices of inspectors general in 1978 ``to 
create independent and objective units'' in the Federal Government to 
do three things: conduct audits and investigations; No. 2, promote 
efficiency and determine fraud and abuse; and No. 3, keep agency heads 
and Congress ``fully informed'' about the problems that IGs find.
  In short, Congress designed inspectors general to shine a bright 
light on waste, fraud, and abuse throughout the Federal bureaucracy 
with the hope that the executive and legislative branches could work 
together to do something about those problems.
  IGs, then, are the original swamp drainers, and--an equally important 
point for those who weren't around at the time it was created--the 
support for creating these offices was breathtakingly bipartisan. The 
vote in the House of Representatives where I was then a Member was 388 
to 6. Now, more than 40 years later, we have 75 offices of inspectors 
general working to stop fraud and abuse.
  Their actions also save the taxpayers billions of dollars. In 2020 so 
far, IGs have identified more than $20 billion of potential savings 
through their audits, reports, and recommendations--$20 billion--and 
this year is not even half over. On oversight.gov, you can find the 
latest figures on these watchdogs' contributions, as well as 
investigative and audit reports on every kind of topic you can think 
of. IGs have found everything from blatant government employee 
misconduct to procurement fraud and, of course, much more. It is all 
there in black and white in the public domain for all to see. These 
inspectors general are helping Congress watch over the people's 
business and ensure the fidelity of agency action.
  We in Congress cannot perform our constitutional mandates of 
oversight without IGs. The IGs' work makes government more transparent 
and more accountable, and that strengthens the public trust in our 
democracy. That is a good thing for Congress and a good thing for the 
Presidency. In this way, these watchdogs serve an indispensable 
function in our system of checks and balances.
  What makes a good inspector general? If I learned anything about 
oversight, it is that this type of work is not for the faint-hearted or 
the thin-skinned or the thick-headed. You need a strong code of 
professionalism to withstand pressures to go along to get along. You 
need a real backbone to wring wrongdoing from the bowels of 
bureaucracy, and you need a quick wit to look on smiling faces and 
discern truths from half-truths and bald-faced lies.
  The law says IGs are supposed to be objective and independent. They 
have to be fierce watchdogs, not lap dogs. They can't bow to personal 
agenda or political machinations, and they shouldn't be subject to 
inappropriate political pressure from any corner whatsoever.
  When IGs are working hard, staying independent, and shining the light 
on waste, fraud, and abuse, they should stay. But when they don't put 
in the work, when they pull the punches, when they became political 
hacks, or when they compromise their vital independence, then IGs must 
go.
  For many years, I have investigated and held accountable IGs from 
both Democratic and Republican administrations for these very failures. 
In 2003, I pushed the Health and Human Services IG to resign over 
whistleblower complaints about poor staff management. I also 
investigated allegations of poor work product, coercive management 
decisions, and questionable hiring practices by the watchdog at the 
Federal Housing Finance Agency. Just last year, I began pushing hard to 
get to the bottom of whistleblower complaints about another apparently 
ineffective Commerce IG, although the media at that time didn't seem to 
care about that despite bipartisan concerns and briefings from my 
staff.

  Alternatively, when IGs come under fire for doing good work, this 
Senator

[[Page S3089]]

has their backs. In 2009, I shined a light on a sudden departure of the 
Amtrak IG, who signed a gag order in exchange for significant payout.
  When the Obama administration blocked a broad swath of the IG 
community from assessing records needed for oversight, I worked across 
the aisle to introduce and finally pass the Inspector General 
Empowerment Act in 2016.
  In short, I have gone to the mat my whole career to ensure inspectors 
general do and are able to accomplish their work with support, 
independence, and integrity. And because this work is so critical to 
Congress and our oversight role and to the public trust, I have worked 
hard to ensure that any effort to remove an IG is for a darn good 
reason. That is what Congress required in the IG Reform Act of 2008, a 
law that then-Senator Obama not only voted for, but he cosponsored.
  That law recognizes two things. First, it is the President's 
constitutional prerogative to manage the executive branch personnel. 
The President can fire an IG. Second, it is Congress's intent in that 
law to support IG independence and maintain public trust. IGs should 
not be removed for blatant political reasons. This requires that 
Presidents tell Congress and the people their reasons for removal of an 
IG.
  The IG Reform Act codified those principles by requiring the 
President to submit to Congress a notice of intent to remove an IG 30 
days in advance and to explain why. The executive branch, under two 
successive Presidencies of both political parties, has sought to ignore 
the law and keep Congress in the dark. Both Presidents provided 
Congress then with paltry excuses of ``lost confidence.''
  In July 2009, less than a year after Congress passed the IG Reform 
Act, then-President Obama removed the inspector general for the 
Corporation for National and Community Service, Gerald Walpin, from his 
post and placed him on administrative leave. Obama's White House 
informed Congress merely that President Obama had lost confidence in 
Mr. Walpin.
  My colleagues and I made it very clear that a vague reference to 
``loss of confidence'' was insufficient and did not satisfy the 
requirements of the very law that President Obama voted for and 
cosponsored when he was a Senator. This began a bout of negotiations 
that resulted in the hold of Presidential nominees and, eventually, a 
bicameral congressional investigation.
  In that case, I pushed for compliance with the statute, held up 
nominees to obtain information, and disagreed with the stated reasons 
for Mr. Walpin's removal. Mr. Walpin was never reinstated. In Mr. 
Walpin's case, a Federal court found later that despite a clear 
congressional record to the contrary, the law doesn't require more than 
what President Obama gave us in any other greater detail beyond its 
``minimal statutory mandate'' to justify the removal of Mr. Walpin.
  Fast forward to the last several months when the current President 
followed the court's incorrect ruling and the Obama precedent by 
removing two Senate-confirmed IGs, placing them on administrative leave 
and telling Congress only, as Obama once did before, that he had lost 
confidence in them.
  In response, I did exactly what I had done before in the Obama 
administration. I, and several colleagues, wrote asking for a better 
explanation. When we finally got a response from the White House 
Counsel, we were left without substantive reasons for the IG's removal.
  So, as before, I notified the majority leader of my intent to object 
to the two administrative nominees until the White House coughed up 
some form of rationale for the removal. I finally got those reasons 
this week. I don't agree with all of them, and I am working to better 
understand others, but because the President has finally fulfilled the 
law, both Congress and the public can look to see for themselves what 
happened.
  This, of course, was the intent of the law all along.
  We took the long road to get here, and we could have avoided all this 
hullabaloo if both Presidents Obama and Trump had just followed the 
statutory notice requirements in the first place, but we are here.
  These episodes have convinced me that the executive branch, 
regardless of what party is in charge, just doesn't get it. From one 
administration to the next, Democrat or Republican, it makes no 
difference to me. This isn't about politics. This is about the 
separation of powers, checks and balances, public trust. It is clear 
that Congress can't rely on any White House to get it right.
  We need to change the law. We need to be clearer, and we need to 
better safeguard the independence of these IGs. That is why I have been 
developing bipartisan reforms to sharpen the independent authority and 
recruitment of those hired and confirmed to serve as inspectors 
general.
  We are not going to enact a clearly unconstitutional law that 
infringes on the President's authority to manage personnel and that 
would surely result in lengthy court battles. But we are going to 
clarify once and for all that the law's notice requirement means that 
Presidents have to give clear, substantive reasons for removing an IG 
and that they can't put an IG on administrative leave without a good 
reason.
  To fully safeguard statutorily required IG independence, we are also 
going to make sure that the President cannot place political appointees 
with clear conflicts of interest into acting IG roles. We can't have 
individuals with political day jobs simultaneously in charge of 
confidential, independent IG matters, including substantive and 
sensitive audits, investigative work, and whistleblower information.
  Today, I have introduced that legislation with my colleagues Senators 
Peters, Collins, Feinstein, Lankford, Carper, Romney, Tester, Portman, 
and Hassan. I want to thank Ranking Member Peters for working with me 
on this. His input has been insightful in crafting this bipartisan 
legislation, and his staff has been diligent in furthering these 
efforts.
  Whether you have been following the important work of inspectors 
general for many years or you just tuned in for the last few, we 
welcome your support. I hope that support continues well past the 
current administration. If we don't update the law, we can only expect 
future administrations to continue to do what has been done lately, not 
giving Congress good reasons
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:


                                              The White House,

                                        Washington, June 12, 2020.
     Hon. Charles E. Grassley,
     Chairman, Committee on Finance,
     U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Grassley: I write to follow up on our recent 
     conversation regarding the removal of the Inspectors General 
     of the Department of State and of the Intelligence Community. 
     As a further accommodation, we are providing the additional 
     information you requested.
       With respect to the State Department Inspector General, 
     please see the attached letter sent to you today from the 
     Department's Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs. The 
     letter includes materials that identify the concerns of the 
     Secretary of State and the Under Secretary for Management 
     with the Inspector General's performance. As to the removal 
     of the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community, the 
     President lost confidence in him and has spoken publicly 
     about this loss of confidence, including on the day after the 
     President notified Congress of his decision.
       As you have stated, the President has the constitutional 
     authority to remove inspectors general. As a matter of 
     accommodation and presidential prerogative, the President 
     complied fully with the statutory notification provision of 
     the Inspector General Act.
       As I said in my previous letter, the President appreciates 
     and respects your longstanding support for the role that 
     inspectors general play. We look forward to the Senate's 
     swift confirmation of all of the President's outstanding 
     inspector general nominees.
           Sincerely,
                                                 Pat A. Cipollone,
     Counsel to the President.
                                  ____

       The following excerpt from an official White House 
     transcript entitled ``Remarks by President Trump, Vice 
     President Pence, and members of the Coronavirus Task Force in 
     Press Briefing.'' The briefing was held on April 4, 2020 in 
     the James S. Brady Press Room of the White House at 4:15 p.m. 
     EDT.
       The full transcript can be found at: https://
www.grassley.senate.gov/sites/default/files/2020-0906-
12%20White%20House%20Counsel%
     20 to%20Grassley%20-%20 IC%20IG%20and%
     20 State%20IG.pdf

       THE PRESIDENT: Think of it: We're paying people not to go 
     to work. How about that? How does that play?
       Q: I understand that.
       THE PRESIDENT: And they want to go to work, by the way. 
     They don't even want--they don't want money. This country is

[[Page S3090]]

     great. But we're paying people. We have to get back to work. 
     That's what I'm saying.
       Go ahead, please.
       Q: Mr. President, this is off topic. It's about the 
     announcement from last night. It's a yes or no question, but 
     not that we expect the answer to be yes or no.
       But wasn't Michael Atkinson doing the job of the Inspector 
     General of the intelligence community, the job he was 
     supposed to do, when he simply took the whistleblower 
     complaint to Congress that hadn't been taken previously? 
     Wasn't he doing the job that he was supposed to do, that 
     American taxpayers were paying him to do? And why did you 
     decide to terminate--
       THE PRESIDENT: I thought he did a terrible job. Absolutely 
     terrible. He took a whistleblower report, which turned out to 
     be a fake report--it was fake. It was totally wrong. It was 
     about my conversation with the President of Ukraine. He took 
     a fake report and he brought it to Congress, with an 
     emergency. Okay? Not a big Trump fan--that, I can tell you.
       Instead of saying--and we offered this to him: ``No, no, we 
     will take the conversation''--where, fortunately, we had that 
     transcript. If we didn't have a transcript with the kind of 
     deception and dishonesty that were practiced by the 
     Democrats, I might not be standing here right now. Okay? 
     Fortunately, we had a transcript and it was a perfect 
     transcript, because even the lieutenant colonel admitted it 
     was correct. Okay?
       Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You asked a question.
       So he took this whistleblower--and I keep saying, ``Where's 
     the whistleblower?'' Right? ``And why was the whistleblower 
     allowed to do this?'' Why was he allowed to be--you call it 
     fraudulent or incorrect transcript.
       So we offered this IG--I don't know him; I don't think I 
     ever met him. I don't think I--he never even came in to see 
     me. How can you do that without seeing the person? Never came 
     in to see me. Never requested to see me. He took this 
     terrible, inaccurate whistleblower report--right?--and he 
     brought it to Congress.
       We offered to have him see my exact conversation. It was 
     all about the conversation, by the way. That was the whole 
     thing, was about the conversation. Right? And then after he 
     saw it, he must've said, ``Wow,'' because as I've said it 
     many times and it drives you people crazy, it was a perfect 
     conversation.
       So instead of going and saying, ``Gee, this is a terrible 
     thing he said about the President's conversation''--well, it 
     was a fraud. I didn't say that. And, by the way, you have the 
     whistleblower. Where's the informer? Right?
       And here's another question: Remember before I did the--
     before I gave the transcript--in other words, before I 
     revealed the real conversation--where's the second 
     whistleblower? Remember the second whistle--
       Wait, wait, wait, wait. There was going to be a second 
     whistleblower. But after I gave the conversation, he just 
     went away. He miraculously went away.
       Where's the informer? Because there was going to be this 
     informer. Maybe Schiff was the informer. You ever think of 
     that? He's a corrupt guy. He's a corrupt politician.
       So, listen, I say this: Where's the informer? Remember, the 
     informer was coming forward. But I gave--because, see, I did 
     one thing that surprised everybody. This gentleman right here 
     said, ``Boy, that was a shocker.'' I revealed the 
     conversation. I got approval from Ukraine because I didn't 
     want to do it without their approval. And they said, 
     ``Absolutely. You did nothing wrong.''
       By the way, President of Ukraine, Foreign Minister said, 
     ``He did nothing wrong.'' And over that, with 196 to nothing 
     vote by the Republicans--not one dissenting Republican vote--
     dishonest Democrats impeached a President of the United 
     States. That man is a disgrace to IGs.
       All right, let's go. Next. Please. He's a total disgrace.
       Q: Mr. President, did you run by your decision to dismiss 
     the Inspector General by Senator McConnell?
       THE PRESIDENT: Okay, we'll get off this because people want 
     to talk about what we're talking about. But let me just tell 
     you something: That's my decision. I have the absolute right. 
     Even the fake news last night said, ``He has the absolute 
     right to do it.''
       But ask him, ``Why didn't you go and see the actual 
     conversation?'' There was no rush. He said, ``Oh we'd have to 
     rush it.'' He even said it was politically biased. He 
     actually said that. The report could have been--you know who 
     the whistleblower is, and so do you and so does everybody in 
     this room, and so do I. Everybody knows. But they give this 
     whistleblower a status that he doesn't deserve. He's a fake 
     whistleblower. And, frankly, somebody ought to sue his ass 
     off.
       Q: I just want to follow up, sir.
       THE PRESIDENT: All right, it's enough with the 
     whistleblower.
       Go ahead, please.
       Q: Mr. President, the governor of New York today said that 
     he is still desperate for ventilators and that he has 
     accepted 1,000 of them from the Chinese government. Are you 
     concerned that states--
       THE PRESIDENT: Well, what he didn't say is--okay, let me 
     tell you what he didn't say.
       Two very good friends of mine brought him those 
     whistleblower--brought him those ventilators, right? Two very 
     good friends of mine--they brought them. If you'd like their 
     name, I'll give you their name.
       Q: But should states and cities have to rely on--
       THE PRESIDENT: No, but he--the governor didn't--
       Q: --China and Russia for supplies?
       THE PRESIDENT: --mention that. It came through the 
     Chinese--the country of China. But they were given by two 
     friends of mine, but he didn't tell you that.
       Now, the governor also--
       Q Who are your friends?
       THE PRESIDENT: You'll see when you read the letter.
       The governor also asked for 40,000--40,000. He wanted 
     40,000 ventilators.
       Now, the governor, as you know, had a chance to get 16,000 
     a few years ago. He decided not to get that. The State of New 
     York has asked for help. I've given him four hospitals, four 
     medical centers. Then I gave him an additional hospital. Then 
     I gave him military people to operate the hospital. They were 
     not supposed to be COVID hospitals. The boat--the ship is 
     not--an interesting thing happened with the ship. People 
     aren't in accidents because there's nobody driving. There's 
     nobody taking motorcycle rides down the West Side Highway at 
     100 miles an hour. People are away. So people aren't being 
     injured.
       Now they're asking whether or not we could open up the ship 
     for COVID. We have given the governor of New York more than 
     anybody has ever been given in a long time. I'll just say--I 
     was going to say ``in history,'' but in a long time. And I 
     think he's happy.
       But I think that--because I watched what he said today, and 
     it was fine. I wouldn't say gracious. It wasn't gracious. It 
     was okay. I must tell you, Gavin Newsom has been gracious--
     Los Angeles, California, the job we've done, and all of 
     California.
       Q: But why does that matter if they're gracious or not 
     gracious if they need the supplies?
       THE PRESIDENT: It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. But I 
     think when we've given as much as we've given to New York, 
     somebody should say--
       Nice--I'll tell you who's been very nice: Mayor de Blasio 
     has been very nice. He understands what we've given him. We 
     brought him some more ventilators, too, yesterday.
       But nobody has been given like New York. And I think--I 
     know he appreciates it. He just can't quite get the words 
     out, but that's okay.
       Q: So when he says--but when he says that he needs 40,000--
       Q: Mr. President--
       THE PRESIDENT: Please, go ahead.