Attorney General Loretta Lynch sent a letter to Congress declaring that the Justice Department will not support a key provision in legislation designed to hold Veterans Affairs officials accountable.
The Veterans Access, Choice and Accountability Act of 2014 included a provision that limits the appeal of a decision to fire an executive employee. The law provides:
Notwithstanding any other provision of law, including section 7703 of title 5, the decision of an administrative judge under paragraph (1) shall be final and shall not be subject to any further appeal.
Loretta Lynch sent a letter to Congress stating that the Justice Department will not support that provision because it is unconstitutional. There is no basis for this assertion, since the Constitution defers to Congress to determine the formation of the government. In particular, Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution includes the power of Congress “[t]o make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces[.]”
Somehow, the Justice Department appears to be inventing an inalienable right of government employees to keep their jobs forever. The Congress created the civil service system, which gives federal employees numerous rights and keeps politics out of hiring and firing of workers. Since then, there is a large body of law that addresses workers’ rights. But the foundation of the workers’ rights came from Congress, not the Constitution. Lynch is probably trying to protect government workers at all cost, since they are the backbone of support for Democrats.
The case in point refers to the firing of Sharon Helman, who headed the Phoenix office of the V.A., where employees covered up the long wait times for veterans. Helman was fired for both the wait time cover-up and for failing to report $50,000 in gifts from a lobbyist. Helman pleaded guilty to the failure to report charge in a plea bargain that includes probation, and she avoided a five-year prison sentence. She was not prosecuted for accepting the gifts, unfortunately.
When Helman appealed her firing before an administrative law judge, the wait time issue was tossed out by the ALJ, but the firing was upheld for the failure to report charge. She has now appealed that decision before the federal courts, and Lynch’s decision will allow that appeal to move forward. But for the corruption charge, Helman would have been reinstated.
Even Bernie Sanders supports the firing provision in the act, stating:
The VA secretary would be given the authority to immediately remove incompetent senior executives based on poor job performance or misconduct.
The failure of this president to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed” as the Constitution demands is one more reason why we need to reform the government starting at the top. Our veterans deserve first-class care for protecting and defending our Constitution, and the present administration is incapable of providing it. There is also little evidence that Hillary would do otherwise.
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