DHS Corruption Exposed - UPDATE

Competes well with the best of the Obama Administration's Prevaricators

This Post has been updated (10 May 2019) 

due to breaking news on this scandal

{ https://cis.org/North/Hidden-News-One-Obama-Official-Vindicated-Another-Falls]   }

Evidence released during the trial/conviction of Sonai Patel, DHS IT Manager, included the news she had stolen a data-base managing 150,000 internal investigations, including background investigations on 250,000 DHS employees].  Charles K. Edwards [then Inspector General] is accused of using that data in a contract proposal to his former employers.  

Also revealed are Edwards' efforts to undercut the effectiveness of the DHS (the) Director of USCIS [Citizenship and Immigration Services), Alejandro Mayorkas.

The unanswered question here is what data was passed over during the "telecommuting" between Edwards wife in India and Patel, and how much of that data was transferred to Chinese Intelligence.  Would that have included the numerous FOIA requests -- and data provided regarding on-going investigations regarding Illegals, Child Sex Trafficking, ATF files, Coast Guard intelligence, etc.

Finally, we are reminded of the fact that DHS then had 250,000 employees!
How is it we are short on Border Patrol Police.

OUR ORIGINAL POST APPEARS BELOW.
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Click here for related article [Washington Post (Carol D Leonnig)]

It appears there is a spark of journalistic integrity left at the Post.  The referenced article is a masterpiece of investigative journalism, and we trust Congress will begin reading the Post again for such stories rather than using it for litter box filler as they did while Katherine Weymouth controlled the editorial process.

This investigative story reveals corruption at the highest levels of the Department of Homeland Security [DHS], the federal agency charged with pulling all federal law enforcement and intelligence activities into one information sharing and enforcement basket [albeit a bureaucratic goat-rope] with a mere 240,000 employees -- most of whom cannot define their job description.

Charles K Edwards served as the acting Inspector General of DHS from 2011 - 13, but, instead of investigating unethical behavior, became the target of Senate investigators as a result of his own unethical behavior, which included joining the subjects of his investigations for drinks and dinners, and sharing with them confidential reports from whistle-blowers and his investigators.

Ultimately, he asked the targets of these investigations how he should handle the disclosures of their unethical and in some cases, illegal behavior -- after which he altered reports to Congress to the benefit of those being investigated.

Edwards also came under fire for
1) Requiring his staffers to drive him on personal errands
2) Using government personnel to help him write his PhD dissertation
3) Hiring his wife to work for his office -- and to telecommute from India for seven months
4) Retaliating against DHS whistle-blowers.

All these illicit activities occurred while Edwards was Mr obama's nominee for the permanent position of Inspector General.

Putting it mildly, Senator Ron Johnson [R-WI] advised:
"We found that Mr Edwards was a compromised Inspector General.  
Any report generated out of his office would be suspect."

Notably, Edwards resigned his position three days prior to his scheduled appearance before the Senate to respond to their inquiries into his activities.

The Senate bipartisan investigation was initiated following the scandal in Colombia in which Secret Service agents were compromised by hiring prostitutes and revealing sensitive information to them. "Whistle-blowers alleged Edwards ordered them to remove derogatory information implicating a White House staff member; more staff members came forward to allege deletions and delays in other reports."

Three DHS employees who questioned the deletions were put on Administrative Leave; among those was the General Counsel who was forced into another position after being placed on paid Administrative leave for EIGHT MONTHS!

DHS "declined" to provide the emails which related to those reports.
[Note to Senate:  Use a subpoena -- not a request!]

DHS General Counsel John Sandweg

At the request of a DHS official [then-DHS General Counsel John Sandweg], Edwards is alleged to have ordered changes to and delayed release of a report on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] which disclosed complaints that DHS had misled Congress and the public about Secure Communities -- a new program to identify illegal immigrants which has come under considerable scrutiny and criticism.

Edwards repeatedly consulted with Sandweg, then DHS-Director Janet Napolitano's top political advisor and General Counsel, on how to respond to Congressional Committee questions.

One of Edwards' emails to Sandweg included this quote:


"I really need some legal help.  Please help me for the next four months."

[This is the equivalent of a criminal prosecutor asking the defendant for assistance on how to handle the criminal's prosecution.]

Sandweg, according to Fox News, came under Congressional criticism since he had "zero law enforcement experience."  He is a former criminal defense attorney whose clients included murderers, sex offenders, and pedophiles.
His clients included
  1) a man convicted of strangling his girlfriend in front of her 4-year-old child,
  2) an identity theft ring, violent felons who had violated their parole, and
  3) a man accused of multiple counts of sexual assault on a minor.
[This guy made the character of "Just Call Saul" look like a saint!]

Why, former Democratic Presidential nominee, John Edwards who was caught in a series of lies, would have been proud to have had Sandweg as his running mate.

You remember John Edwards.

Liz Edwards; died in 2010

He ran as a Democrat for President on the basis of good teeth, good hair, and the sympathy vote since his wife [Elizabeth Edwards] was dying of cancer; we learned during the campaign that he was cheating on his dying wife with Rielle Hunter [aka: Lisa Jo Druck],  who bore him a child.
 

But, we digress.

Now, Sandweg is a piece of work, but, hold on, there's still more to this story.

The Senate report noted that Charles Edwards conferred on a regular basis with not only Sandweg, but also with Janet Napolitiano's Chief of Staff, Noah Kroloff during the period he was investigating the Secret Service scandal.

Kroloff resigned his position with Napolitano, and is a Partner of Global Security and Intelligence Strategies [GSIS] -- a consulting and advisory firm.
-- Should we ask how many contracts GSIS has with DHS?
-- Would there be a conflict of interest there?
--  Is the Pope Catholic?

The Senate report also disclosed that DHS IG Charles Edwards reclassified a Transportation Security Administration [TSA] report critical of "imaging screening".

The classification was bumped up - inexplicably - from SECRET to TSC [TOP SECRET/SENSITIVE COMPARTMENTED INFORMATION] - an egregious breach of classification authority to prevent almost all but a few in Congress access to the report.

[TS/C is a classification restricted to only the most sensitive intelligence relating to highly technical or restricted methods and sources, and NEVER for a routine report on procedural effectiveness. The SCI access generally requires that an individual undergo a polygraph exam; access requires a lengthy procedure due to the sensitivity of the materials, meaning that only a few Senators and Congresspersons would be eligible for access. (Then-senator obama was never granted a security clearance at all due to the absence of legitimate documents in his personal history).]

Some of you may be uncertain as to the role of an Inspector General [IG].

In essence, the IG is a government [or military] watchdog whose mission is to ensure integrity within the organization.  The IG investigates using special agents/professional investigators and auditors to pursue allegations of wrong-doing, and is expected to provide reports to higher headquarters of his/her findings prior to or during investigations and possibly consequent criminal proceedings.  The President appoints IGs for HUD and the Agency for International Development; all the rest are appointed by the heads of the agencies they serve -- but are essentially approved by the President.

Notably, in this [OBAMA] Administration, most of the IG positions are vacant -- leaving little or no internal review process for whistle-blowers or corruption monitoring.  This vacuum could explain the extraordinary levels of corruption in government agencies in this Administration.

To set your mind at ease with respect to the reports of extraordinary corruption in the DHS, you'll be gratified to know that the new Inspector General is John Roth, whom the Senate confirmed last month [by a simple majority].  He responded to the Senate report of DHS corruption with the words:

"... this report contains valuable insights that my office will be taking into account 

as we move forward with our oversight mission."

Now, for you denizens of California [who gave the US Pelosi, Waters Boxer, and Feinstein], we want to remind you that Janet Napolitino, who headed the DHS during so much of this corruption, is now President of the University of California, and is routinely the subject of protests when she visits the various campuses [to be fair, in one instance at Berkeley, two students did launch a "counter-protest"]. In her new role, controlling your college kids' education, do you feel safer, and aren't you happy your tax dollars are paying her salary?

Counter-Intelligence - Obama-Style

Think of me as your Big Brother - I Protect You from the Truth  [InfoWars.com]

Click here for related post [Federation of American Scientists (FAS)]

The Administration's War of Terror has stepped up a notch.  Mr obama has created a "counter-intelligence" directive, which in effect, counters the collection and accurate analysis of professional intelligence by adding a new step -- the Fear Factor -- to the Intelligence Community.  Meet with a  journalist and risk your career and a jail sentence.

Intelligence Community Directive (ICD) 119 effectively prohibits intelligence personnel from contact with the Media/journalists -- unless they have specific authorization to do so
"... to mitigate risks of unauthorized disclosures of intelligence-related matters that may result from such contacts."

[ICDs replace the old DCIDs -- which older Intelligence professionals may remember]

Since the new regulation "does not distinguish between classified and unclassified intelligence information", traditional interaction between intelligence analysts and operatives with journalists to informally trade information will now become a thing of the past.

Some eons ago, in our Spook and Analyst days, we routinely met with professional journalists who were notable for their areas of areas of expertise to pick their brains on who was who in political, economic, and military hierarchies, who controlled key financial instruments, who controlled the Media, and who within a foreign government might be amenable to giving up "Open Source" or even "Classified" information.

Those were the days of both professional journalists and professional intelligence officers.

We recall discussing, some decades back, political and military events in a Latin American country in order to get a feel for the progress of a rumored coup.  After reading CIA TD-FIRs, DIA IIRs, Attache reports, DIRNSA intercepts, we were still not certain of who was doing what to whom, when or where.

After discussions with two journalists who specialized in the region, we were able to put all the pieces [unclassified and classified] together and created an assessment for the Pentagon Black Book in which we predicted the coup down to the day and even the hour [10:00 am local time], naming and assessing the key players in the coup, and detailing the composition of the succeeding junta -- and their commercial supporters.

That analysis drew guffaws from the senior Pentagon officers reading it, and the reigning IC powers of the era announced their scorn for such an amateurish analysis.

Our lead line, on the day the coup actually took place was
"As predicted, ......"

This led to a meeting of the heads of each segment of the IC as it was structured then, all demanding to know how it was that we had such precise information, and accusing us of keeping classified information from the IC.

We responded that we had used the classified reports which their operatives and analysts had provided the IC, but we felt no obligation to direct those same personnel to "Open Source" materials which they could have found in the US and foreign Press reports.  We provided each agency with copies of their reports which we had used, and then supplemented that material with Media reports we had assembled which filled in the gaps of the classified material.

Although we made few friends that day [as the IC directors and analysts were forced to eat humble pie], we did catch the attention of the DCI (Director of Central Intelligence) who felt that our precise coup prediction was not an aberration since we had a previous solid string of such accurate assessments.  Thus, we were gratified when the DCI blessed us with the DCI Exceptional Intelligence Analyst Award, a graduate fellowship to Georgetown and Oxford, a bag of money to travel throughout the world and interview diplomats and intelligence officers, and an assignment to provide special intelligence assessments to the Secretary of State and to write State inputs to National Intelligence Estimates.

But, we digress.

If you can't eavesdrop, it's not Intelligence

The point of this blog post is that the Director of National Intelligence [JimmyBob Clapper] is neutering the Intelligence Community by blocking their access to some of the most lucrative sources of information and leads.  In the absence of interaction with professional journalists, the Intelligence analysts and operatives lose a valuable resource.

Clapper has traditionally opposed Human Intelligence [HUMINT], and regards human espionage with disdain. Why, it's almost immoral!

Now, we've known Mr Clapper for several decades, and recognize his intellectual limitations, particularly where they relate to the various components and capabilities of the Intelligence Community.

Mr Clapper, like little Keith Alexander, kept his understanding of Intelligence collection to only electronic collection means -- a process which he promotes based on his experience and stock holdings in those Defense contractor companies which support electronic surveillance, be it SIGINT, IMINT, ELINT, or, anything but HUMINT!

The coup takes place tomorrow at 10:00 am

You see, even though HUMINT is generally the most reliable source of intelligence, augmented by the other INTs, it is far too inexpensive.

Our annual budget for running a global DCS amounted to the cost of a single satellite pass over a target.

Now, how, you ask, is a Defense Contractor like Boeing, Lockheed, or General Dynamics to make a billion dollar profit from a DCS operation, the total cost of which will likely be less than $200,000.

On the other hand, building and launching a satellite requires billions of dollars in support equipment and monitoring personnel -- not to speak of hundreds of IT servers and equipment processing thousands of yottaflops, and hundreds of hardware and software subcontractors.  Why, it's the American Way!

Now, to be fair, JimmyBob did claim credit for creating DOD HUMINT, and in particular, the DOD HUMINT Clandestine Service [DCS], until we reminded him over dinner one evening that we had built the DCS back in 1984 [about 16 years prior to his claim] -- while he was a mere two-star at CincPAC -- notable for his blockage of HUMINT operations.

But, we would not want to accuse JimmyBob of prevarication in such matters; we'll leave that to Congress when they charge him with perjury for his more egregious transgressions.  We may even blow him kisses as he is marched off to jail in a perp-walk in an orange jump-suit and cuffs.

We grieve that Mr Clapper has been given control over national intelligence collection since he has degraded the process which was designed to deliver to national decision-makers accurate assessments of threats to the United States.

Of course, today, the greatest threat to the US comes from within.

DOD Forcing Out Combat Troops?

This Experienced Soldier will be forced out [TimeMilitary.Files]

Click here for related article {Army.mil}

This Administration seems intent on forcing out of the Army our elite, combat-experienced troops as it reduces the size of the Military.  When the Pentagon is finished, our Army will essentially be led by political generals with no combat experience, and populated by troops and officers equally deficient in combat experience or any semblance of esprit de corps.

With the new Military, however, we expect that leadership will not only be politicized, but will be well-represented by every level of unique sexual category -- to ensure there is no discrimination.

The most recent targeting process is the ban on tattoos -- which soldiers have embraced throughout history.  Notably, Rangers, Special Forces, and Airborne troops, not to speak of the majority of sailors, have traditionally added tattoos to arms, legs, chests, and backs to advertise their combat tours and particular expertise.  Just as the Green and Tan Berets added a level of pride to the Special Forces and Rangers, tattoos have set apart those who marked their experience and expertise [e.g., Combat Engineers and EOD specialists] with lettering and imagery which let their friends, peers, subordinates, and superiors know their history.

Now, we can understand some of the restrictions, e.g., ink on the eyelids and inside the mouth and on the face; and extremist, sexist, and racist tattoos which are also banned.

However, the new restrictions include tattoos on the neck, wrists, hands, and fingers.  Also, according to Army Pamphlet 670-1, forbidden tattoos include those
"... below the elbows and knees".
That pretty much rules out 50% of the existing tattoos, and most of our combat-experienced troops.

Now, here's the interesting part of this process.

1)  These restrictions apply to all soldiers, regardless of rank, to include officers, warrant officers, and non-commissioned officers in the Active Duty, Reserves, and the National Guard.
2)  Commanders must
     a)  perform annual checks for new tattoos and
     b) "... are required to document and photograph all Soldiers' tattoos above the neckline and
         below the elbows and knees, keeping that information in the servicememeber's official records.
3)  Enlisted personnel exceeding the limit of four [4] tattoos "... cannot request commissioning or appointment..." -- even if they are grandfathered, in accordance with the Pamphlet.

Senior soldiers interviewed, including officers and non-coms, advised that these new regulations will force out otherwise good soldiers -- particularly those with combat experience.

SGM-A Chandler listens to his Mom

Oddly, the soldier we'd expect to challenge the implementation of these new regulations, Sergeant Major of the Army Ray Chandler, seems to be going along with these new regulations with no challenge.

He did note, in a recent interview, that his children have tattoos, and that he promised his Mom that he would never get a tattoo.

And, we commend him for listening to his Mom.

But, we recall our time in the Military when soldiers tended to think for themselves, and to take pride in their specialties and accomplishments.

We'll cut him some slack though, since it appears that some of the initial requirements seem to have disappeared, perhaps due to his influence.  This included the requirement to surgically remove the existing tattoos.

We are, however, appalled that Secretary of Defense Hagel, whom we supported during his nomination based on his Enlisted Service, would allow these new regulations to be emplaced without regard to their impact on the combat readiness of our Army [yes, we said OUR Army, since we and OUR relatives continue to serve to protect OUR country!].

Those in my generation came into the Service pretty much on a non-volunteer basis - i.e., primarily via the Draft.  Nonetheless, a lot of us stayed in because we felt the Army -- and our country -- needed us.  So, we teachers, lawyers, engineers, and concert pianists -- stayed in and served OUR country, even though we disagreed with OUR country's leadership.

We do recall asinine regulations, enforced by our Academy company commanders, which required that sideburns not extend beyond the hole in our ears, or that we could not part our hair in the middle, or that our undershirts could not have V-Necks because the [West Point] Brigade Commander's wife objected to seeing the hair on our chests, or that we had to have shined boots even when we were in forward operating bases in mud up to our knees.  Soldiers in combat environments tend to operate in different modes than parade ground popinjays.

Now that the faux wars [the purpose of which we still ponder] have drawn down, and our Army is to be reduced to a strength of 420,000, we'll see the nonsense regulations once again take over as the spit-and-polish advocates from the academies demand, we expect to see less combat readiness, and an emphasis on parades and shiny uniforms -- and lots and lots of meaningless ribbons worn on the pretty new uniforms of senior officers and non-coms.