“A notoriously corrupt Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) manager fired in the first day of President Donald Trump’s presidency — to rousing acclaim from veterans who heralded it as a sign of lasting reform — has been returned to work by VA officials after he filed a civil-service protections appeal,” the Daily Caller reported.
Also this month, a court ruled that the VA may not even be able to fire the Phoenix hospital director, who is a convicted felon as a result of job-related misconduct.
The courts and the agency pencil pushers are more powerful than the President of the United States.
The response from the administration:
“As we have underscored since January 20, President Trump and Secretary [David] Shulkin have made employee accountability at VA a top priority, and we will continue to take appropriate disciplinary actions with our employees. The Secretary in this case was not able to overturn this decision once he was made aware of it. We need this ability in new legislation.”
Rep. Miller said last September that the VA will not be fixed until the problem of employee accountability is fixed.
“For too long, union bosses, administration officials and their enablers have used every trick in the book to help VA bureaucrats who can’t or won’t do their jobs remain firmly entrenched in the agency’s bureaucracy,” he said.
The fired employee DeWayne Hamlin is very corrupt. He is the worst of the worst.
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Department of Veteran’s Affairs CEO, DeWayne Hamlin offered an employee $305,000 to quit after she played a role in exposing his drug arrest. He was fired on Inauguration Day.
Hamlin was being investigated for a string of unethical and illegal acts including driving under the influence, diversion of painkillers without a prescription, negligent hiring and attempts to induce fraud against another federal employee and VA whistleblower.
In 2015, Hamlin was also under investigation by Washington Examiner for improper “delegation of authority” where he was paid $179,700 despite being absent from the hospital for 80 days in a one-year period in 2014.
Apparently, being absent from work was not the only problem Hamlin was dealing with in 2014. Florida police caught him sitting in a car smelling of alcohol at 2 a.m. He refused to take a breathalyzer twice. Police then found oxycodone on Hamlin even though he did not have a prescription.
When an employee wouldn’t take a bribe to fire another employee at Hamlin’s behest, bosses told her she would be fired.
The Office of Special Counsel, prodded VA leadership into investigating last year. Up until then, they did nothing, likely because they can’t. Look, even the President can’t get rid of this guy.
Hamlin helped clone more just like him. He served as a “coach” at the Leaders Shaping Leaders training session in September. McDonald said the training is the number-one way to shape the agency’s culture.
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