The entire program held earlier today (a “congressional field hearing in Northern Virginia on how the so-called Department of Government Efficiency…and Donald Trump damaged the federal government, decimated public services, and hurt federal employees”) is well worth watching. Below, though, I want to focus on what former Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-VA10) had to say, in part because she’s a lifelong Republican – but NOT a Trump supporter – and also because what she had to say was so powerful.
- “I really appreciate the work you are doing on behalf of our federal employees and our civil service community. And as a Republican – even though I want to make clear that I’ve never voted for Donald Trump or his team and have worked against them vehemently – I do want to associate myself with all of the remarks that you all have made in introducing today. And I want to associate myself with all of the remarks that have preceded me here today in agreement and say that as a Republican, and since…I don’t think any Republicans have apologized to you what has happened over the past year, I’d just like to take the opportunity, even though I’m a former, to apologize to you as a Republican for what has happened, which has been so egregious, the trauma. Unfortunately, the only promise that has been kept by this administration from day one is the trauma that they have put on federal workers. And that is something that has been egregious. And I’ve been happy to be able to work with many of the people here over the past year in trying to mitigate as much as possible, and I appreciate the report and all the work that you have been doing here.”
- “I know it has been heartbreaking for me to see the attacks on the honorable and dedicated service of so many thousands of people that have been my neighbors for decades – the people I was honored to serve and from whom I learned so much, and to see them to be attacked to lose their careers and for us as a country to lose their service. But I also think and I hope and I think I certainly from what everyone has talked about here as the caucus that is being set up you know we have to consider how for the people have been driven out how are we going to make them whole in the future, because that person who has lost their job hasn’t just lost their job now, they have lost that ability to…work in that career. And they’ve lost their retirement. They’ve lost that ability maybe to do the things they were doing. And so when we are able to maybe get them back in that position, how do we make that whole? I hope that is something that we’ll be able to look at.”
- “Now, I not only did serve as a member of Congress, I was able to serve on this great committee as a chief counsel and do that oversight. And I also did serve as a senior justice department official in the Bush administration. And post 9/11, I did see firsthand the value of the many civil servants at the DOJ, FBI, and the National Security [Council]. So, it has been particularly sickening for me to see what this administration has done in politicizing the Justice Department and the FBI and the National Security [Council] in particular. The gutting, as was mentioned, of the Civil Rights Division. I think there’s only two people now left at the Public Integrity Office – of course, what a surprise. And the IG’s as was mentioned, how those have been gutting. So, it’s not only a brain drain, but an ethics drain that is constantly driving out both legal and professional talent, so that there is not that respect of the rule of law and honoring the oaths that we all take as public servants.”
- “Yesterday, we certainly saw that in action with Pam Bondi’s deplorable performance – that was one of the most unprofessional, obnoxious that I have ever seen in my decades in Washington. Of course, it was for an audience of one. She was called out by the president of the Florida Bar Association. But I think of the career staff watching that, who had to realize their boss is unhinged and corrupt. And that same thought perhaps has to go through the minds of those whose careers are now under the whims of the likes of a Kash Patel, a Pete Hegesth, Kristi Noem, Tulsi Galbard, or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who have also been dismantling their agencies and also under little or no congressional oversight. They see and hear their bosses make a mockery of their professional and decades of work and professionalism and make public statements that they know are false. I know how demoralizing this is because I have heard from so many people who I used to represent how upsetting this is and many of them have had felt they’ve had to leave.”
- “And if it’s any comfort it’s not just the career people they attack and demoralize, they are even attacking their own political appointees. Because for example, you saw here in Virginia you had two US political appointees who had to leave within months of being nominated our US attorneys. They were conservative Republicans who had to leave their US attorney positions because, unlike Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche, who every day make clear that they are there to work as Trump’s personal attorneys, they had to leave because they wouldn’t do that kind of thing. Now, I think you all know you people like Todd Gilbert, who was at one point the Speaker of the House in the Virginia House of Delegates. He left after a month because, you know, I think the stories have been out there; I won’t speak for Todd, but when you leave after a month in a political position that certainly a Republican want would want to have, you know why they’re leaving.”
- “So, our public policy and the public good are in trauma as a result, I believe. And so, you see things like what happened in Minnesota is a large and part example of this thinking where the adults have left the building. Even Republican conservative adults there aren’t there, and that’s by design as you all have pointed out. So I commend you for the Federal Workforce Caucus and all the good work that these people here and the ones you’re going to hear in the next panel can do. And second, I would really like to recommend developing a bipartisan advisory committee of professionals who I do think can help serving serve you and various agencies who can assist you on oversight now and more hearings like this, where you can give voice to more and more people in these agencies now and into the next Congress. And you can build that record with these shadow hearings with a bipartisan record, because there are many conservative Republicans who will be happy to join you in identifying, it wasn’t like this before. And we’d be happy to share lots of names of career and appointed professionals on both sides of the aisles who are concerned…”
- “And then finally, I think we all know that we all need to speak out more, because one of the most thuggish features of this administration from the very top is to silence critics. I mean, when you’re hearing that from Marjorie Taylor Greene of all people, as you heard, from your former colleague who had to leave because even she was getting death threats not only to herself, but her son. And when she told the president that, [Trump] said, ‘too bad, sorry about that.’ We know more and more people don’t speak out. And you know we have to do that, and those of us former and and many of my former Republican colleagues, the few that we are that do speak out, they do that because we know how difficult it is for federal employees and others to speak out.”
********************************************************
