Trump fires inspector general said to be investigating Pompeo, involved in impeachment probe
The White House fired the State Department Inspector General late Friday, according to a State Department spokesperson and a senior congressional aide -- the latest senior U.S. official involved in the impeachment probe into President Donald Trump to be forced out by his administration.
Appointed to the role in 2013 by President Barack Obama, Linick is a career government lawyer who served as a senior Justice Department official under President George W. Bush and assistant U.S. attorney in California and Virginia under President Bill Clinton. “This firing is the outrageous act of a President trying to protect one of his most loyal supporters, the Secretary of State, from accountability,” added Engel, accusing Trump of “systematically remov[ing] the official independent watchdogs from the Executive Branch.”
Linick played a more minor role in the impeachment probe. As ABC News was first to report in October, he requested an urgent meeting with senior lawmakers during the probe to turn over documents his office obtained. Those papers, later confirmed to come largely from Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, showed what one senior State Department official called a disinformation campaign that smeared U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, which appeared to have led to her firing.
In addition to Linick and Atkinson, Trump has waged something of a war on inspectors general in recent weeks. He effectively removed Glenn Fine, the acting Department of Defense inspector general, who was set to monitor spending from the $2 trillion coronavirus stimulus package.
Last August, it said senior political appointees in charge of one bureaus treated employees in a “harsh and aggressive manner” and created a “negative and ‘vindictive’ environment.”
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