"These are all phony scandals! This country is ungovernable! You're all racist if you don't overlook my plethora of scandals! Now, start recycling those VA hard drives!" |
Why is that when a scandal breaks during the Obama Presidency, the people doing the investigations get spied on? It's almost as though Obama behaving like a Leftist Chicago politician.
From The Washington Examiner:
Congressional staffers investigating data falsification and whistleblower retaliation at the Department of Veterans Affairs regional office in Philadelphia were given a workspace there that was wired with activated audio microphones and video cameras, the chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs said Monday.
Committee investigators also glimpsed a notebook used by the agency's regional director that bore written instructions to ignore their requests for information, Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., said during a late-night hearing.
Miller, chairman of the veterans committee, said he is “shocked” by the directives from VA officials to ignore congressional investigators.
“You will not ignore this committee anymore,” Miller said to Allison Hickey, VA's under secretary for benefits, who testified at the hearing.
Miller sent two committee staff members to the Philadelphia facility July 2 to determine whether claims-processing data was being falsified to hide long delays and errors that could cost veterans the benefits they deserve because of illnesses or injuries linked to military service.
Before the meeting began, one of Miller’s staffers, Lauren Rogan, went to the bathroom, where she saw a notebook by the sink that included the phrase “ignore Rory,” a reference to her colleague Rory Riley.
Circled at the top of the page were the names of two whistleblowers who were cooperating with the committee to expose improper processing of veterans claims in a way that improved agency statistics but did not resolve the cases.
The notebook belonged to Lucy Filipov, acting director at the regional office. It apparently reflected an earlier conversation with Diana Rubens, who at the time was deputy under secretary for benefits.
After the meeting, case files and computers were placed in a room where Filipov insisted Rogan and Riley should work. As the two checked the room, they found the sound and video equipment were active, and they insisted on being moved.
[...]
The exchange over surveillance and stonewalling was a bizarre twist in the committee's investigation into long backlogs veterans face when seeking disability compensation for service-connected medical conditions.
Whistleblowers told the committee of “gross mismanagement” and deceptive practices used at regional offices to hide the months-long delays veterans face when they file a disability claim.
Kristen Ruell, a quality review specialist in Philadelphia, said she faced retaliation after she tried to expose data manipulation, improper payments and other “gross misinterpretations of the law.”
Ruell was one of the two whistleblowers whose names were circled on the top of Filipov’s notebook.
Just another day in the Obama Administration.
How many scandals in this administration again? And how many times has the White House responded by denial, stonewalling, and domestic espionage?
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