Tag Archives: Retaliation

In Retaliation For Gorman Expulsion, U.S. Kicks Out No.2 Diplomat at RussianEmbassyUSA

February 28, 2022 By in DCM, EUR|Europe, Hotspots, Realities of the FS, State Department, Top Ranks, Trends, U.S. Missions Tags: , , , , ,

 

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Via Politico: Mark Lenzi Accuses @StateDept’s Leadership, Diplomatic Security of Retaliation #HavanaSyndrome

October 26, 2021 By in Americans Abroad, Blinken, Diplomatic Security, Functional Bureaus, Govt Documents, Investigations, MEDical, Realities of the FS, Security, State Department, U.S. Missions Tags: , , , , , , ,

 

Via Politico:

“One of those victims, current State Department official Mark Lenzi, sustained traumatic brain injuries while on assignment in Guangzhou, China, in late 2017, when he was working as a security engineering officer in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security.
[…]
Lenzi provided documents to POLITICO that detail his claims that State’s leadership has retaliated against him for speaking out publicly and for working with the members of Congress who have been investigating the matter.”
[…]
“On his first day as secretary of State, Secretary Blinken — who I know and have the utmost respect for — told the Department of State workforce that he ‘would not tolerate retaliation against whistleblowers,’” Lenzi said. “However, under his tenure, retaliation against me by the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Bureau for my whistleblowing activities with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel and with Congress has actually increased.”
[…]
Since then, Lenzi says, the State Department has retaliated against him in a number of ways. Documents viewed by POLITICO show that the department most recently yanked his administrative leave last month — forcing him to use sick leave or leave-without-pay to participate in medical studies and attend therapy sessions — and has denied him access to his classified computer system, even though he retains his top-secret security clearance.
[..]
The federal agency that handles whistleblower claims previously found “a substantial likelihood of wrongdoing” in the case of Lenzi and his claims of retaliation, according to an April 2020 Office of Special Counsel memo. That retaliation probe is ongoing.

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Delayed Report Over Retaliation Against @StateDept Career Staffers Heats Up

August 13, 2019 By in Federal Agencies, Leadership and Management, Mike Pompeo, Org Life, Oversight, Political Appointees, Politics, Realities of the FS, Rex Tillerson, Secretary of State, State Department, Trump Tags: , , , , , , ,

 

In September 2018, we blogged about State/OIG and the Office of Special Counsel looking into political reprisals at the State Department (See State/OIG and OSC Reportedly Looking Into Political Reprisals @StateDept); Office of Special Counsel on Political Inquiries/Political Discrimination During Reassignments).
Via Politico:

The probe is expected to cover a wide array of suspected mistreatment of Foreign Service and Civil Service officers by Trump political appointees. The majority of the alleged improprieties are thought to have occurred under former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, but the accused include some political appointees who also served under Pompeo.

Among the allegations: that a political appointee made loyalty lists of career staffers she considered supportive or unsupportive of Trump; that numerous career employees, including high-ranking ones, were given low-level duties processing Freedom of Information Act requests to punish them for work they did under former President Barack Obama; and that one career staffer’s assignment to a top policy post was cut short because of her Iranian ancestry and her work on the Iran nuclear deal.

Revelations that outside conservative figures, such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, may have played a role in targeting career staffers have fueled the anticipation of Linick’s findings.

Originally, one major report was expected, but Linick has said he decided to split it into two. The first will cover dysfunction in the State bureau that deals with international organizations. The second will cover the actions of top officials who report directly to the secretary.

We’ve asked State/OIG about this and here’s what the office told us:
“We submitted the draft report to the Department in July. As is always the case, we have given the Department the opportunity to submit a response to the report, and the Department has informed us that it wishes to do so. We have granted the Department’s request for two extensions for this report, and its response is due this week. We regularly grant extensions because, if at all possible, we believe that it is important to have the Department’s response to our conclusions. We anticipate publishing the report this month.”

 

Trump Threatens Retaliation Against Countries That Issue Travel Warnings For USA #GetReady

August 12, 2019 By in Consular Work, Functional Bureaus, Govt Documents, Huh? News, Leadership and Management, Real Post of the Month, Realities of the FS, State Department, Trends, Trump Tags: , , , , , , ,

 

 

On August 10, USA Today reported that the president has threatened retaliation Friday against countries and organizations that issue travel warnings on the United States because of gun violence (see Amnesty International Issues Travel Advisory For the United States of America).
The president said during the gaggle “We are a very reciprocal nation with me as the head. When somebody does something negative to us in terms of a country, we do it to them.”
Oh, Lordy, that’s going to be the end of the State Department’s Travel Advisories, wouldn’t it? Better not show him the other countries’ color coded map of the United States where these gun violence is happening, or that’s going to blow up the State Department’s travel advisory travel map, too.

But seriously, per Foreign Affairs Manual, the travel advisories are part of the Consular Affairs’ Consular Information Program (CIP). It is a public outreach program through which the Department of State, through the Bureau of Consular Affairs (CA), and U.S. embassies and consulates, “inform U.S. citizens and nationals of potential threats to their health or safety abroad and provide information about consular services.” Also this:
“All information provided to the public through the CIP represents the Department’s objective assessment of conditions in a given country based on reliable information available at the time of publishing, as reported by posts, various Department bureaus, other U.S. government agencies and departments, foreign governments, and credible open sources.”
Most importantly is this:
“Information provided through the CIP, including Travel Advisories and Alerts for U.S. citizens, is based on the overall assessment of the situation in country.  By necessity, this analysis is undertaken without regard to political or economic considerations.”
The Travel Advisory Review Committee (TARC) brings Department stakeholders together to discuss security information and how it is relayed via Travel Advisories.  TARC includes representatives from the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, (DS/TIA/ITA); Post’s regional bureau; the Office of the Under Secretary for Political Affairs; the Office of the Under Secretary for Management; Representatives from other bureaus as appropriate based on the threat, to include: 1) Coordinator for Counter Terrorism (CT), when the threat is terrorism related; 2) Medical Services, when the threat is health related; 3) Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs (EB/TRA/OP), if there are aviation issues; 4) Legal offices (OCS/L/CA), when there are legal issues; 5) The Office of the Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security (T), when there is a nuclear issue; 6) Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs (OES), when the threat is environmental; and 7) Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL), if threat presents human rights concerns, such as LGBTI issues.
The TARC is chaired by CA’s Overseas Citizen Services, an office that reports to the Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs Carl Risch. Mr. Risch, however, has overall responsibility for the Consular Information Program (CIP), to include supervising and managing the program, and is authorized to determine the final wording of all products. CA’s Carl Risch reports to the Under Secretary for Management Brian Bulatao. U/Secretary Bulatao in turn reports to the Deputy Secretary John Sullivan and Secretary Mike Pompeo.
So, if this president starts retaliating against countries that issue Travel Warnings for the United States, who’s going to tell him “no”?  We’re ready to borrow the rules from the World Rock Paper Scissors Society, if needed.

 

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Whistleblower Protection Memo – How Useless Are You, Really?

November 13, 2018 By in Congress, Diplomatic Security, Org Life, Oversight, Questions, Realities of the FS, Security Clearance, State Department Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Back in July, we blogged that State/OIG cited a State Department’s revocation of an employee’s security clearance in retaliation for whistleblowing in its Semi-Annual Report to Congress for October 2017-March 2018. State/OIG recommended that the whistleblower’s security clearance be reinstated (see State/OIG Finds @StateDept Revoked Security Clearance in Retaliation For Whistleblowing).  Retaliatory revocation is not an unheard of practice but we believed this is the first time it’s been reported publicly to the Congress.

Also in July, there was a joint OIG-State memo noting that “Whistleblowers perform a critically important service to the Department of State and to the public when they disclose fraud, waste, and abuse. The Department is committed to protecting all personnel against reprisal for whistleblowing.  This summer OIG told us that Congress enacted a new provision in 2017 that requires an agency to suspend for at least 3 days a supervisor found to have engaged in a prohibited personnel practice, such as whistleblower retaliation, and to propose removal of a supervisor for the second prohibited personnel practice. (see @StateDept’s Retaliatory Security Clearance Revocation Now Punishable By [INSERT Three Guesses].

In September, we note the time lapse since the official report was made to the Congress and wondered what action the State Department took in this case.  If the State Department believes, as the memo states that “Whistleblowers perform a critically important service to the Department of State and to the public” we really wanted to know what the State Department has done to the official/officials responsible for this retaliatory security clearance revocation.

We also want to see how solid is that commitment in protecting personnel against reprisal — not in words, but action.  So we’ve asked the State Department the following questions:

1) Has the security clearance been reinstated for the affected employee, and if so, when?

2) Has the senior official who engaged in this prohibited personnel practice been suspended per congressional mandate, and if so, when and for how long? and

3) Has the State Department proposed a removal of any supervisor/s for engaging in this prohibited personnel practice now or in the past?

As you can imagine, our friends over there are busy swaggering and to-date have not found the time to write back.

Folks, it’s been eight months since that annual report went to the U.S. Congress. If you’re not going to penalize the official or officials who revoked an employee’s security clearance out of retaliation, you were just wasting the letters of the alphabet and toner in that darn paper writing out a whistleblower protection memo.

And the Congress should be rightly pissed.

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@StateDept’s Retaliatory Security Clearance Revocation Now Punishable By [INSERT Three Guesses]

September 13, 2018 By in Oversight, Realities of the FS, Regulations, Security Clearance, State Department Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

 

In July, we blogged about a short item in the latest State/OIG Semi-Annual Report to Congress that indicates it substantiated an allegation of a security clearance revocation in retaliation for an employee’s whistleblowing activity under PPD-19. State/OIG recommended that the whistleblower’s security clearance be reinstated. See State/OIG Finds @StateDept Revoked Security Clearance in Retaliation For Whistleblowing

On July 20, 2018, an unclassified memo jointly signed by Deputy Secretary John Sullivan and State/OIG Steve Linick was released by the Deputy Secretary’s office (with a Whistleblower Info flyer). The memo says in part:

Whistleblowers perform a critically important service to the Department of State and to the public when they disclose fraud, waste, and abuse. The Department is committed to protecting all personnel against reprisal for whistleblowing.

The attached memorandum describes how to make a whistleblowing disclosure and the legal protections that exist for whistleblowers, including Foreign and Civil Service employees and employees of Department contractors and grantees. The memorandum also describes how to file a complaint if you believe you have been subject to improper retaliation.

The memo also identifies the Whistleblower Ombudsman for the State Department as  Jeff McDermott:

The Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2012 requires Inspectors General to designate a Whistleblower Protection Ombudsman. Jeff McDermott has been designated as the Whistleblower Ombudsman for the Department. He is available to discuss the protections against retaliation and how to make a protected disclosure, but he cannot act as your legal representative or advocate. You may contact him atWPEAOmbuds@stateoig.gov.

The memo concludes with a reminder that State Department employees “have a right” to communicate directly with the OIG, and provides contact details:

Remember that Department employees always have a right to communicate directly with OIG. The OIG hotline number is 800-409-9926, and the hotline website is https://oig.state.gov/hotline. OIG’s main website is https://oig.state.gov/.

We suspect that this memo may have been prompted by the IG report to the Congress that an employee had his/her security clearance revoked in retaliation for whistleblowing.

So we wrote to the Whistleblower Ombudsman Jeff McDermott with our congratulations, and, of course to ask a couple of simple questions:

Citing the Sullivan-Linick memo, we asked how is this going to discourage retaliation on whistleblowers when we don’t know what consequences officials face when they are the perpetrators of such retaliation?

Given the latest example of an employee whose security clearance was revoked in retaliation for whistleblowing, we asked if anyone at the State Department has disciplined for doing so?

Since we did not get a response from the Whistleblower Ombudsman, we asked State/OIG for comment last month and was told the following:

Please note that there are different disclosure and review processes for contractor and employee whistleblower retaliation allegations. There is also a different review process for allegations of whistleblower retaliation in the form of actions that have affected an employee’s security clearance. OIG primarily reviews contractor whistleblower and security clearance retaliation allegations, while the Office of Special Counsel generally reviews employee retaliation allegations.

Congress enacted a new provision last year that requires an agency to suspend for at least 3 days a supervisor found to have engaged in a prohibited personnel practice, such as whistleblower retaliation, and to propose removal of a supervisor for the second prohibited personnel practice. OIG believes that these new provisions will demonstrate that there are serious consequences for whistleblower retaliation.

The case you are referring to is a retaliatory security clearance revocation case, and the decision about what action to take has not yet been determined by the Department.

So it’s now September. If the State Department believes, as the memo states that “Whistleblowers perform a critically important service to the Department of State and to the public” we really would like to know what the State Department has done to the official/officials responsible for this retaliatory security clearance revocation.

 

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Rainey v. State Department: “Right-to-Disobey” (Precedential Decision)

August 25, 2015 By in AF |Africa, Career Employees, Regulations, State Department Tags: , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

Posted: 1:49 am EDT
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The following is a decision from the Merit Systems Protection Board, and considered a precedential decision,  one that can be cited as authoritative going forward.

Appellant: Timothy Allen Rainey
Agency: Department of State
Decision Number: 2015 MSPB 49
MSPB Docket No.: DC-1221-14-0898-W-1 Issuance
Date: August 6, 2015
Appeal Type: Individual Right of Action Action
Type: Retaliation

Whistleblower Protection Act Jurisdiction

The appellant filed an Individual Right of Action appeal alleging that the agency stripped him of certain job duties and gave him a poor performance rating after he refused to follow an order that would have required him to violate federal acquisition regulations and training certification procedures. The administrative judge dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, finding that the appellant’s claim of retaliation based on refusal to violate acquisition regulations and training procedures did not amount to a nonfrivolous allegation that he refused to obey an order that would require him to violate a law.

Holding: The Board affirmed the initial decision.

1. While employees are protected from whistleblower retaliation for refusing to obey an order that would require a violation of the law under 5 U.S.C. § 2302(b)(9)(D), the Supreme Court made clear in Department of Homeland Security v. MacLean,135 S. Ct. 913 (2015) that this protection does not extend to violations of an agency regulation or policy.

The MSPB assumed the employee appeals function of the Civil Service Commission and was given responsibilities to perform merit systems studies and to review the significant actions of OPM. State Department’s civil servants have appeals rights in the MSPB.  The employee also has a right to request review of the final decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Text of full ruling is here – 2015 MSPB 49 (pdf).

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No Publicity Zone — 2012 Judicial Actions Involving Foreign Service Grievance Board Rulings

December 20, 2013 By in Ambassadors, Court Cases, Foreign Service, FS Groups, FSOs, Grievance, Iraq, Realities of the FS, Secretary of State, State Department Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

— Domani Spero

We’ve  heard from the FS grapevine about an agreement that there will be no publicity of grievance results.  If that’s true, well, that’s a terribly bad agreement, right?

So if you want to keep up with Foreign Service grievance cases that went to court, you can check FSGB’s annual report to Congress which details judicial actions related to Board cases during the year.   We have listed them below from the 2012 report and have included the links to PDF files for all the court rulings but one.  In he future, most of the cases should be available via the GPO but if not available there, you can also try looking them up using pacer.gov (requires registration and payment for document view/download).

Karl Hampton v. Tom Vilsack | PDF

Karl Hampton is a former Foreign Service Officer with the Department of Agriculture who was terminated for cause after a hearing before the Board in 2007. He subsequently filed a Title VII suit against USDA, claiming discrimination on the basis of race, retaliation for engaging in protected activity, and a hostile work environment. Last year the District Court for D.C. granted USDA’s motion for summary judgment on nine of the ten counts alleged, and later dismissed the tenth count. Karl Hampton v. Tom Vilsack, 760 F. Supp. 2d 38 (D. D.C. 2011). Hampton appealed that decision. In a de novo review, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed the District Court’s ruling. Karl Hampton, Appellant v. Tom Vilsack, Secretary, United States Department Of Agriculture, Appellee, 685 F.3d 1096; (U.S. App. D.C. 2012).

Richard Lubow, et al., v. United States Department of State, et al., | PDF

The plaintiffs in Richard Lubow, et al., v. United States Department of State, et al., 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10780, (D.D.C. 2013) were five Diplomatic Security Agents who had served in Iraq in 2004. They grieved the Department’s application of a cap on their premium pay and its decision not to grant them a waiver of repayment of the amounts that the Department had paid them in excess of that cap. The FSGB concluded that, contrary to the Department’s findings, the grievants were not at fault in incurring the overpayments and thus were eligible for a waiver of their debts. However, the Board also found that it was within the Department’s discretion to decline to grant the waivers, and that the Department had appropriately considered the relevant factors and had not abused its discretion in denying the waivers. The District Court affirmed those findings and granted summary judgment in favor of the Department.

Jeffrey Glassman v. the U.S. Department of State (unable to locate this case. See this article from WaPo: Disabled but determined, U.S. diplomat Jeffrey Glassman sues over forced retirement)

In an order dated September 25, 2012, Judge Rosemary Collyer of the District Court of D.C. dismissed three counts of the plaintiff’s claims in Jeffrey Glassman v. the U.S. Department of State, et. al., Civil Action No. 10-1729, as well as both the Department of State and the Foreign Service Grievance Board as defendants, on procedural grounds. Glassman is a former officer of the Department of State who grieved his involuntary retirement, claiming it was a result of his disability and therefore illegal. The Board denied Glassman’s claim. Glassman appealed that decision to the district court, while also independently claiming a violation of the Rehabilitation Act. While dismissing three counts and two defendants, the court ordered the case to proceed on Glassman’s remaining claim, that the Foreign Service precepts have a disparate impact on him and others with disabilities because of their emphasis on unusually difficult or dangerous assignments, in violation of the Rehabilitation Act. The Secretary of State, as head of the agency, remained as the sole defendant.

Richard Baltimore, III v. Hillary Clinton | PDF

In Richard Baltimore, III v. Hillary Clinton, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 153253 (D.D.C. 2012), former Ambassador Baltimore appealed a decision by the FSGB sustaining charges by the Department of State involving misuse of an official vehicle and failure to report the gift of a rug, that resulted in a 45-day suspension without pay. Baltimore challenged the Board’s decision as arbitrary and capricious. The D.C. District Court upheld the Board’s reasoning and decision.

Yamin v. United States Department of State | PDF

On November 19, 2012, Jeremy Yamin petitioned the D.C. District Court to review the FSGB’s May 23, 2012 order denying in part his request for attorney fees incurred in a grievance appeal. Yamin is a Department of State officer who had received a one-day suspension in a disciplinary action. In his appeal to the FSGB, the Board upheld the charge, but found the one-day suspension to be excessive and reduced the penalty to an admonishment. Yamin requested attorney fees and expenses in the amount of $71,645.48. The Board approved $12,385.03, denying the rest. Yamin requested a review of this decision.

 

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