Thread: GOP Claim: Top Fast and Furious Officer Now Getting Two Salaries

Wednesday, 22 Aug 2012 12:24 PM
By Martin Gould
Newsmax

A key figure in the Fast and Furious gunrunning debacle is on paid leave from the government at the same time that he is picking up a six figure salary from a new job, two Republican leaders charged on Wednesday.

Bill McMahon, one of five officials named in Congress’ initial report on the scandal, is now working for J.P. Morgan in the Philippines, Sen. Chuck Grassley and Rep. Darrell Issa claimed.

Now the two are asking questions as to how McMahon could be allowed to double-dip with his new job.

“Under any reading of the relevant personnel regulations, it appears that ATF management was under no obligation to approve this sort of arrangement,” Grassley and Issa wrote to Todd Jones, the acting head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF).

Grassley of Iowa and Issa of California said a senior ATF official confirmed to them that McMahon “has recently obtained full-time employment in the private sector,” serving as executive director of the Global Security and Investigations Group at J.P. Morgan in the Philippines.

“This unusual arrangement is apparently designed to allow Mr. McMahon to reach retirement eligibility while on extended leave for four or five months and simultaneously begin a second career before separating from government employment,” they wrote to Jones.

“Given McMahon’s outsized role in the Fast and Furious scandal, the decision to approve an extended annual leave arrangement in order to attain pension eligibility and facilitate full-time, outside employment while still collecting a full-time salary at ATF raises a host of questions about both the propriety of the arrangement and the judgment of ATF management.”

McMahon was the ATF’s deputy assistant director for field operations. In their initial report released in July, Issa and Grassley — who have led Republican investigations into Fast and Furious — said he “rubber-stamped critical documents that came across his desk without reading them.”

Issa, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee and Grassley the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee asked Jones 22 specific questions about authorization for McMahon’s new job and his current employment with ATF. They asked for answers by September 4.

Fast and Furious was a scheme in which the ATF was told to stand by and allow guns to be bought in the United States and smuggled across the border into Mexico. The idea was that the weapons would be tracked and lead investigators to drug cartel kingpins.

However, the trace of nearly all the guns was lost and they have been used in the commission of hundreds of crimes on both sides of the border, and have been linked to the death of two federal agents.

GOP Claim: Top Fast and Furious Officer Now Getting Two Salaries

August 22, 2012
By: Dave Workman
examiner.com



Three weeks after this column first revealed that a major figure in Operation Fast and Furious was likely to retire soon, the two men leading Capitol Hill’s investigation of the scandal are now asserting that he is already working in the private sector while still drawing a government paycheck.

William McMahon, former deputy assistant director for Field Operations at the agency, is “serving as Executive Director of the Global Security and Investigations Group at J.P. Morgan in the Philippines,” according to Senator Charles Grassley and Congressman Darrell Issa.

That revelation came in a letter Grassley and Issa sent Tuesday to B. Todd Jones, acting director of the embattled Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. This column has obtained a copy of the letter, which may be viewed here. The Washington Post is reporting this new development here.

McMahon's name was prominently mentioned in the Joint Staff Report on Fast and Furious that was released in late July. That report is available here.

“This unusual arrangement,” Grassley and Issa wrote, “is apparently designed to allow Mr. McMahon to reach retirement eligibility while on extended leave for four or five months and simultaneously begin a second career before separating from government employment.”

McMahon apparently has been using up personal leave time, sources told Examiner.

“While the legality of McMahon’s outside employment and leave arrangement may arguably be unclear, the fact that ATF management chose to authorize it is not,” Issa and Grassley say in their letter. “Under any reading of the relevant personnel regulations, it appears that ATF management was under no obligation to approve this sort of arrangement. Given McMahon’s outsized role in the Fast and Furious scandal, the decision to approve an extended annual leave arrangement in order to attain pension eligibility and facilitate full-time, outside employment while still collecting a full-time salary at ATF raises a host of questions about both the propriety of the arrangement and the judgment of ATF management.”

“Rather than imposing consequences for his admitted failures,” the letter continues, “the ATF appears to be rewarding McMahon. Through this unusual arrangement, ATF has essentially facilitated McMahon’s early retirement and ability to double dip for nearly half a year by receiving two full-time paychecks—one from the taxpayer and one from the private sector. Moreover, ATF did not wait for the Office of Inspector General to complete its report on Fast and Furious before approving the arrangement. This is in sharp contrast to the posture the agency has taken with whistleblowers like Special Agent John Dodson, who is told he must wait until the Inspector General’s report is complete before the agency will even consider his simple request for a statement retracting the false statements made about him by agency leadership.”

Sources told Examiner Wednesday that the Inspector General’s report was transmitted to the Justice Department this week for “review” and one source indicated the report could be released sometime in the next two weeks. Release just before the Labor Day weekend could bury any damaging aspects, and it could become further removed from public attention by the Democrat convention in early September.

“This is not the culture of change that you promised to bring to ATF,” Grassley and Issa told Jones in their letter.

Grassley could be particularly upset because, as he told this column, "heads should roll" at the agency. That did not mean they should roll into a cushy new job in the private sector.

Grassley, Issa zero in on dual employment of F&F figure - Seattle gun rights | Examiner.com