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- The National Security Agency attorney general installed by Trump was placed on administrative leave a day after taking office, due to an investigation by the Defense Department’s inspector general, CNN reported.
- The installation of Michael Ellis just before President Joe Biden took office sparked criticism that the Trump administration was trying to dig a loyalist into a civilian position.
- Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
Michael Ellis, the National Security Agency’s attorney general who was installed just a day before President Joe Biden took office, is now on administrative leave because the Defense Department’s Inspector General is investigating his appointment, CNN reported.
Last week, Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller asked the NSA chief to install Ellis as general counsel by 6 p.m. Saturday. The next day, the agency said it was moving ahead with the installation of Ellis and said it would begin the day before Biden was sworn in.
“Mr. Ellis accepted his last job offer yesterday afternoon. The NSA is moving forward with his job,” an NSA official told Insider on Sunday.
National security legal experts have criticized efforts to bury Ellis in the role just days before a new administration takes over.
The post of NSA attorney general is not political but a civil servant role, which means it will be more difficult for the new Biden administration to fire him. However, the new president can easily reassign him to a less important post.
Read more: Biden’s inauguration is unlike any before. The photos show how his ceremony compares to those of previous presidents.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi also criticized the move and sent Miller a letter on Monday asking him to “immediately cease” Ellis’ installation.
“The circumstances and timing – immediately following President Trump’s defeat in the election – of Mr. Ellis’ selection, and this eleventh-hour effort to push that placement over the last three days of this administration are highly suspect,” he said. wrote Pelosi.
On Wednesday, a DoD spokesperson told Insider it did not comment on open investigations, and an NSA spokesperson said he did not comment on personnel matters.
Ellis’ nomination came shortly after President-elect Joe Biden was due to win the 2020 election in November. In that same month, the Washington Post reported that Democratic Senators Mark Warner and Jack Reed asked the Pentagon Inspector General to investigate Ellis’ appointment on the grounds of “inappropriate political influence.”
Read more: I stepped into the US Capitol’s huge security bubble to cover the most surreal presidential inauguration of my life. Here is what I saw.
“The combination of timing, the candidate’s comparative inexperience, the reported qualifications of other finalists, and press accounts of White House involvement create a perception that political influence or considerations may have played a role. an undue role in a public service merit-based selection process, ”Warner and Reed wrote in a letter in November, CNN reported.
Ellis’ selection also came when nearly a dozen senior government officials were sacked, forced to resign or resigned in protest, with outgoing President Donald Trump carrying out a political purge in the Defense Department.
Ellis served as lead counsel for Representative Devin Nunes, who is a Trump loyalist. Concerns over his installation revolve around helping Nunes gain access to intelligence documents in 2017 that helped Trump politically attack Democrats, the Post reported.
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