Yes, FEMA’s Mike Brown is under fire and yes, it’s tempting to stop piling on, but this isn’t just some random person filling a low-level job on the third floor of the OEOB. As recent events have shown all too well, the nation needs and depends on a skilled and capable FEMA chief — and the president needs to choose one — and this has clearly not happened.
University of Colorado law prof Paul Campos fleshes out the details of what he calls Brown’s “padded resume” in a stunning new article for The New Republic. We all knew Brown’s background was limited, but in this case, it’s worse than we thought.
For example, Brown’s official bio explains that he practiced law for 20 years prior to his 2001 appointment as FEMA. But that’s not the case at all.
For one thing, Brown’s legal career began by studying at a semi-accredited law school no one’s ever heard of. In 1981, he joined a local firm, but didn’t last and he was gone 18 months later. He tired to put together a private practice, but that too failed. By 1987, Brown had “more or less abandoned his nascent legal career.”
He moved to Colorado, but his legal career consisted primarily of grading answers to bar exam questions. There’s no evidence of him practicing law in any other capacity.
Then came the horse gig.
Brown’s job was to make sure that horse show judges followed the rules, and his enthusiasm for their strict enforcement won him the nickname of “the czar,” as well as the enmity of contestants, some of whom sued the Association, as well as Brown himself. According to a September 6 Denver Post article, Brown became embroiled in controversy when allegations were made that, to help pay his legal fees, Brown solicited a nearly $50,000 contribution from an IAHA member whose conduct he was supposed to regulate.
Failed lawyer, failed congressional candidate, failed horse-rule enforcer. Then Bush becomes president and, all of a sudden, Brown is the general counsel for a major federal agency. Two years later, he’s the director.
Brown will probably lose his job soon, but the truth is, serious questions have to be answered about how this man was chosen in the first place. Indeed, who is more deserving of blame — Brown, for taking a critically important job for which he was not qualified, or Bush, for hiring him?
Campos describes hiring Brown to run FEMA as an “act of gross recklessness.” After what we’ve seen on the Gulf Coast, I’d say it’s borderline criminal.