The General Services Administration generally isn’t one of those departments that captures the public’s attention. The GSA is, by design, a behind-the-scenes agency — it helps other parts of the government function by managing federal contracts.
In recent years, however, the GSA has found itself under the spotlight, after the White House tried to exploit the agency for Republican campaign efforts, with the dubious participation of GSA chief Lurita Doan.
A year after the controversy first broke, and with the White House having already used her, Doan was shown the door.
At the request of the White House, General Services Administration chief Lurita Alexis Doan resigned last night as head of the government’s premier contracting agency, ending a tumultuous tenure in which she was accused of trying to award work to a friend and misusing her authority for political ends. […]
Doan’s resignation came almost a year after Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said he believed Doan could no longer be effective because of the allegations about her leadership.
Waxman’s committee began investigating Doan after stories in The Washington Post showed that she had approved a $20,000, no-bid arrangement last July with a business run by a friend and had tried to reduce the budget of the agency’s inspector general.
Doan had been under scrutiny by the inspector general, Brian Miller, as well as members of Congress and the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, which protects federal employees from prohibited personnel practices.
Investigators already concluded that Doan violated the Hatch Act last year when she pressed political appointees how they could “help our candidates” at a GSA briefing conducted by Karl Rove’s office. That she hadn’t been fired sooner is a reflection of the administration’s tolerance for corruption and unethical behavior.
In case you’ve forgotten what an embarrassment Doan has been — it’s hard to keep the members of Bush’s hackocracy straight, sometimes — Paul Kiel refreshes our memories.
To refresh your memory on Doan’s parade of horribles: her Golden-Duke-nomination-worthy testimony came in response to a meeting in early 2007, where Karl Rove’s aide Scott Jennings came to brief GSA staff on the prospects for Republicans in the 2008 elections. The PowerPoint presentation detailed which seats were “House Targets” and which “Senate Targets”, which states were “Republican Offense,” and which “Republican Defense.” For those who’ve never witnessed this proud moment in administration history, Doan’s initial blubbering testimony on the topic is worth a watch:
After the presentation, Doan asked Jennings in front of everyone how GSA projects could be used to help “our candidates.” Jennings replied that topic should be discussed “off-line,” the witnesses said. Doan then replied, “Oh, good, at least as long as we are going to follow up.” At least, that’s the version given by “half a dozen witnesses” to The Washington Post and the Office of Special Counsel. Doan just couldn’t remember saying anything like that.
Matters took a turn for the worse when Doan was found to have violated the Hatch Act, worse still when it appeared she retaliated against GSA employees who cooperated with Office of Special Counsel’s investigation of her partisan activities, and even worse still when she approved a no-bid business deal for one of her friend’s companies.
I’d just add one thing to Paul’s report: when congressional Democrats started to go after Doan for her apparent corruption, House Republicans accused Dems of being racist (Doan is African American). In one especially disgusting display, Rep. Chris Shays (R-Conn.) said, “I find that when an African-American is a Republican, somehow, she is treated differently by Congress.”
In any event, so long, Lurita. We knew you far too well.