By Kenneth J. Theisen, 5/24/07
According to the Los Angeles Times (“Report accuses GSA
chief of illegal politicking for GOP” 5/24/07) General Services Administration
(GSA) investigators have accused Lurita A. Doan, the head of GSA “of violating
the law by improperly attempting to use her agency to help Republican political
candidates,” in a preliminary investigative report.
The Times quotes the report as stating, “The GSA administrator displayed
no reservations in her willingness to commit GSA resources, including its human
capital, to the Republican Party. Her actions constitute an obvious misuse of
her official authority and were made for the purpose of affecting the result of
an election.” If true, these actions constitute an illegal violation of
the Hatch Act which prohibits partisan activities by government employees
acting in a governmental capacity. The report states, “One can imagine no
greater violation of the Hatch Act than to invoke the machinery of an agency,
with all its contracts and buildings, in the service of a partisan campaign to
retake the Congress.”
At a January 26, 2007 meeting of over 30 GSA managers an aide
to Karl Rove, J. Scott Jennings briefed them about the 2006 mid-term elections
and the political outlook for the 2008 elections. After the presentation Doan allegedly asked, “What
can we do to help our candidates?” According to the Los Angeles Times other such
meetings were held at most other Cabinet agencies and presentations were made
by Rove and other White House officials.
The Bush regime has repeatedly mobilized the resources of
the federal government to gain partisan advantage in elections. The unfolding Justice Department firings”
scandal has shown us some of the maneuvers where U.S. Prosecutors were
pressured to use their vast resources to prosecute alleged voting fraud cases
or other corruption cases in order to impact election results. In other cases, it appears prosecutors were
fired for bringing corruption cases against Republican officials such as Duke
Cunningham who took massive bribes as a Congressman. The Cunningham case and
other Republican corruption cases tainted the party just before the 2006
elections.
The Bush regime has never been shy about using its power.
The administration alleges that the meetings described above where Rove and
other regime officials made presentations to federal government employees (many
of whom are political appointees who can be fired directly by the administration)
and pressure them to “help our candidates” are perfectly legitimate. The
administration sees nothing wrong with using executive agencies directly under
the president to win elections. But then
a regime that stole two presidential elections would not be expected to be
bothered by laws such as the Hatch Act which were designed to avoid such misuse
of power. But it should bother the rest
of us.