GAO Rules DHS Secretary and Deputy Are Not Valid Officeholders

 The Government Accountability Office has determined that Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and his deputy, Ken Cuccinelli, are not legally entitled to hold their offices. Further, the previous acting DHS secretary, Kevin McAleenen, also apparently held the office illegally.

The problem is multi-tiered but stems from the Trump Administration’s habit of staffing executive branch offices with acting officials rather than having appointees go through Senate confirmation hearings. The tactic was followed to avoid the problem of having Democrats filibuster President Trump’s picks but is also due to the fact that many Trump Administration officials don’t stay in their jobs long. Under the current status of Senate rules, only judicial nominees are exempt from filibusters.

The GAO found that the problem began with the resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen, who resigned as DHS secretary in April 2019. McAleenen, then the commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, succeeded Nielsen. The problem was the McAleenen was not next in line for the job. Under the Homeland Security Act, Christopher Krebs, the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, was next in line of succession when Nielsen stepped down.

“Mr. McAleenan assumed the title of Acting Secretary upon the resignation of Secretary Nielsen, but the express terms of the existing designation required another official to assume that title,” wrote Thomas H. Armstrong, the GAO’s general counsel, in the agency’s report to Congress.

“As such, Mr. McAleenan did not have the authority to amend the Secretary’s existing designation. Accordingly, Messrs. Wolf and Cuccinelli were named to their respective positions of Acting Secretary and Senior Official Performing the Duties of Deputy Secretary by reference to an invalid order of succession,” he added.

McAleenen’s illegal promotion to head the DHS caused a cascading failure that now puts the authority of Wolf and Cuccinelli in doubt. McAleenen appointed Wolf as the Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans and Cuccinelli as Principal Deputy Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Because McAleenen was improperly in the role of acting secretary, appointments that he made are also being questioned. Wolf’s own elevation to acting secretary is now threatened because the GAO report found him “ineligible” for the job based on his appointment by a secretary who improperly headed the agency.

The GAO findings don’t have an immediate effect but the matter is being referred to the DHS Inspector General to determine who should be heading the agency. The IG will also consider whether actions and policies implemented by McAleenen, Wolf, and Cuccinelli should be overturned.

Back in March, a federal judge ruled that Cuccinelli was illegally appointed to head the US Citizenship and Immigration Services. As part of the ruling, the judge overturned changes to the asylum process implemented by Cuccinelli on the grounds that he had no authority to do so. The new GAO determination could similarly vacate a number of decisions going back more than a year.

Reps. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), who are on the Homeland Security and Oversight committees, called upon Wolf to resign, saying in a statement, “GAO’s damning opinion paints a disturbing picture of the Trump Administration playing fast and loose by bypassing the Senate confirmation process to install ideologues.”

DHS officials told the Washington Post that the GAO report was “baseless.”

The GAO ruling raises concern about many other positions in the Trump Administration that have been filled with temporary appointments. Back in February, the Washington Post noted that 22 cabinet-level jobs had been filled with acting officials for a total of more than 2,736 days.

The revelation that DHS has been operating with an illegal command structure for more than a year underscores the fact that there are few legitimate shortcuts in the federal bureaucracy. There is a right way to do things and a wrong way. Trying to cut corners often causes more problems than following the rules, inconvenient though they may be. In this case, not following the rules may mean that a year-and-a-half of DHS decisions are walked back and that taxpayers have lost money that was paid in salaries to people who had no authority to do their jobs.

The whole matter recalls my dad’s sage advice about how to do a job: “If you don’t have time to do it right, you’ll have to find time to do it over.”

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump Administration Says 21 States Were Targets of Election Hacking

On Friday, the Department of Homeland Security notified 21 states that they were targets of hacking during the 2016 election. DHS did not identify the states publicly, but several states did confirm that they had been informed of the hacking by the federal government.

The Associated Press contacted every state election office regarding the hacking. States that confirmed that they had been targeted included Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.

The notifications were a rare confirmation from the Trump Administration that the Russian attempts to interfere with the election were real. The notifications came on Friday, the day of the week typically reserved for announcements the Administration prefers to have overlooked.

Some state election officials and congressmen were critical of the Administration for its slow pace in sharing information about the cyberattacks. “It is completely unacceptable that it has taken DHS over a year to inform our office of Russian scanning of our systems, despite our repeated requests for information,” California’s Democrat Secretary of State Alex Padilla said. “The practice of withholding critical information from elections officials is a detriment to the security of our elections and our democracy.”

“We have to do better in the future,” said Senator Mark Warner (D-Va.), a member of the Senate committee investigating Russia’s actions.

The DHS report did not specify the source of the hacking attempts, saying in a statement, “We are working with them to refine our processes for sharing this information while protecting the integrity of investigations and the confidentiality of system owners.”

Several state election officials did specifically name Russia as the culprit, however. Alaska Elections Division Director Josie Bahnke said that computers in Russia had looked for vulnerabilities in the state’s networks. A statement by the Wisconsin Election Commission referred to “Russian government cyber actors.”

In most cases, the state computer systems were not breached, but Illinois was an exception. A previous report indicated that hackers gained access to the Illinois voter registration computers and tried to alter or delete data.

A secret NSA document leaked to The Intercept by Reality Winner last June showed that the Russians had also targeted private companies that contract with state governments to provide software for electronic voting machines. Voting machines are typically not tied to computer networks, but could be vulnerable through software updates. The document said the GRU, Russian military intelligence, was responsible for the attacks.

So far, there is no evidence that any attempts to alter software or data was successful. “There remains no evidence that the Russians altered one vote or changed one registration,” Judd Choate, president of the U.S. National Association of State Election Directors, told Reuters.

Russia has denied any involvement in the cyberattacks on the US voting infrastructure.

Also on Friday, President Trump referred to the Russian hacking as a “hoax” in a tweet. Since the election, the president has had little to say about the Russian cyberattacks even though there is widespread agreement among intelligence agencies that the Putin government was directly involved.

  

Originally published on The Resurgent 

Collection of blood samples at roadblocks ires Alabamans

Drivers in Alabama over the weekend were concerned as rumors of sporadic roadblocks spread through northeastern Alabama. According to the rumors, which spread quickly on Facebook and other social media, the roadblocks were manned by local law enforcement and agents of the Department of Homeland Security who were collecting DNA samples from drivers.

The rumor seemed to be confirmed by law enforcement officials on the Alabama news site, AL.com. The AL.com report said that law enforcement authorities in St. Clair and Bibb counties had confirmed that the roadblocks took place as part of a research study by the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation.

Lt. Freddie Turrentine of the St. Clair County Sheriff’s Department told AL.com that the roadblocks were positioned at several locations around the county from Friday through Sunday. Off duty deputies would stop cars and ask for participation in the voluntary and paid survey. Turrentine said that signs at the roadblocks clearly stated that participation was voluntary and for pay. Drivers were offered $10 for a mouth swab and $50 for a blood test. Those who refused were not detained, Turrentine said, even though social media reports had indicated otherwise.

A report on Birmingham’s ABC 33/40 quoted Erika Skeivlas, a driver who participated in the survey. Skeivlas said that researchers swabbed her mouth and took a blood sample after asking her a few questions from an iPad. Skeivlas said, “Basically they were asking how much over the counter or prescription medication you take? How many times a day do you take it? Do you drink alcohol? Do you drive after drinking?”

Skeivlas said that she was given a paper stating that the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation was conducting the survey which was funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to “better understand impaired driving on our nation's roadways.” There was no indication that the Department of Homeland Security was involved in any way.

Jose Ucles, a spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, told AL.com on Sunday that the researchers did not collect DNA, but were testing the volunteer drivers for over-the-counter, prescription, and illegal drugs as well as checking the driver’s blood alcohol content. The results of the tests were kept anonymous and not relayed to law enforcement.

The roadblocks were part of a major driver impairment study at 60 different locations within the country. Previous studies were done in 1973, 1986, 1996 and 2007. Lt. Turrentine confirmed that St. Clair County had also participated in the 2007 study.

Diane Williams, the Pacific Institute’s communications officer, confirmed to Examiner that no DNA samples were taken at the roadblocks. John Lacey, the researcher responsible for the study was not immediately available for comment.

Originally published on Atlanta Conservative Examiner