More Thuggery In The Obama Administration

Anyone who even tries to look into the activities of the Obama Administration can expect some sort of retaliation or intimidation. We have seen that pattern in the six years of this administration. The Justice Department and the Internal Revenue Service, to name two, are among the agencies used by the government to silence dissent, intimidate any opposition, or sidetrack investigations into corruption. Recently there has been a new example.

Ed Morrissey at Hot Air posted an article today about a recent leak from the Secret Service that House Oversight chair Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) had been rejected when he attempted to join the Secret Service. DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson and acting Secret Service chief Joseph Clancy have both apologized for the leak, but that doesn’t change the fact that the leak occurred. I am sure that the fact that Representative Chaffetz is investigating the Secret Service for its recent failures has nothing to do with the leak. Yeah, right.

The article reports:

Senior staffers for a House committee overseeing the Secret Service have asked the Obama administration to investigate complaints that agency employees circulated private personnel information revealing that the panel’s chairman was once rejected for a job as an agent, according to people familiar with the discussions.

The committee staff referred the issue Thursday to the Department of Homeland Security after receiving whistleblower complaints that Secret Service staff at agency headquarters had circulated potentially unflattering information about Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah). He has been an outspoken critic of Secret Service managers after a string of security lapses.

Chicago politics has truly come to Washington.

Even the Democrats are beginning to be embarrassed. The article reports:

“I won’t be intimidated, but I’m sure that’s what it’s intended to do,” [Chaffetz] said.

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), ranking Democratic member of the committee, called the allegations “disturbing” and agreed with Johnson that they must be thoroughly investigated.

“If that’s true, I find it appalling,” Cummings said. “There is absolutely no room for this kind of activity in the Secret Service… If true, it simply continues to erode the credibility of one of our most important agencies.”

If this sort of behavior continues, we will become a banana republic. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson has already refused to let Secret Service members testify before the Committee investigating them (makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it?).

Congress needs to develop some backbone and stand up to the bullying and intimidation tactics of the Obama Administration. It sounds as if Representative Chaffetz is willing to do just that.