NYT : State Dept. Official Blocked Inquiries, Congressman Says

State Dept. Official Blocked Inquiries, Congressman Says

By DAVID STOUT and BRIAN KNOWLTON | September 18, 2007

WASHINGTON, Sept. 18 — A top House Democrat began an inquiry today into accusations that the State Department inspector general repeatedly interfered with investigations into fraud and abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan, including defects in construction of the huge United States embassy in Baghdad, and put loyalty to the Bush administration ahead of his duties to American taxpayers.

Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, the chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent the inspector general, Howard J. Krongard, a 14-page letter spelling out accusations that he said came from several current and former employees of that office, who documented their charges with e-mails.

Mr. Waxman wrote that the staff complaints followed Mr. Krongard’s testimony on July 26 to the House committee. Some of the accusers have sought “whistleblower” status, which protects government employees who report malfeasance from being punished for doing so, Mr. Waxman said. The accusations are serious and far-reaching, and included assertions that Mr. Krongard has effectively become a political defender of the administration rather than, as his job is meant to be, a studiedly neutral overseer of its spending and practices.

“One consistent element in these allegations is that you believe your foremost mission is to support the Bush administration, especially with respect to Iraq and Afghanistan, rather than act as an independent and objective check on waste, fraud and abuse on behalf of U.S. taxpayers,” Mr. Waxman wrote.

Mr. Waxman invited Mr. Krongard to respond to the accusations at a committee hearing on Oct. 16.

A State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack, said today that he did not know whether department officials had seen the letter yet. Mr. Krongard himself was said to be traveling, and calls to his office for comment were not immediately returned.

Since Democrats gained control of the House in the 2006 elections, Mr. Waxman has made no secret of his relish in probing activities of the Bush administration. One of the more serious accusations against Mr. Krongard is that he interfered with an investigation into the conduct of Kenneth Tomlinson, the head of Voice of America and a close associate of Karl Rove, President Bush’s former political adviser, by passing information about the inquiry to Mr. Tomlinson.

Mr. Waxman wrote that Mr. Krongard’s detractors have described “a dysfunctional office environment” in which he routinely bullies and berates employees and shows contempt for the work of career professionals. As a result, turnover has been so high that the inspector general’s office has been severely compromised, Mr. Waxman wrote.

“Your strong affinity with State Department leadership and your partisan political ties have led you to halt investigations, censor reports and refuse to cooperate with law enforcement agencies,” Mr. Waxman wrote, citing the accounts of disgruntled present and former employees. The assertions in Mr. Waxman’s letter included these:

¶That while the State Department had spent more than $3.6 billion on contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan, “you refused to send any investigators to those countries to pursue investigations into wasteful spending or procurement fraud and have concluded no fraud investigations relating to the contracts.”

¶That Mr. Krongard had prevented his investigators from cooperating with a Justice Department investigation into waste, fraud and abuse involving the new United States Embassy in Baghdad, “and followed highly irregular procedures in exonerating the prime contractor, First Kuwaiti Trading Co., of charges of labor trafficking.”

¶That he had barred his investigators from seizing evidence that they believed would have implicated a major State Department contractor in procurement fraud in Afghanistan.

In the inquiry involving Kenneth Tomlinson, State Department investigators determined that Mr. Tomlinson had used his office to run a “horse racing operation” and had improperly put a friend on the payroll, according to a summary of a report made public by a Democratic lawmaker. Mr. Tomlinson has denied doing anything improper.

Mr. Waxman also said in his letter that Mr. Krongard had “censored portions of inspection reports on embassies,” meaning that critical information on security and vulnerability was dropped from reports to Congress.

Mr. Krongard became inspector general in May 2005. He worked previously for Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, an international law firm, and before that, served as general counsel of Deloitte & Touche.

He is a 1961 graduate of Princeton University, where he was class president and an all-American lacrosse goalie, and graduated with honors from Harvard Law School.