5/23/2023 0 Comments Impeachment trial smooze” Sondland was fired last year - not for his excesses, but to avenge his testimony in the first Trump impeachment trial, which resulted from his involvement in Trump’s attempt to pressure the Ukrainian government to investigate Biden and his son Hunter. That included over-the-top luxuries, such as a pool-Jacuzzi heating system and a pergola, described by the State Department as an “ outdoor living pod. Trump’s ambassador to the European Union in Brussels, Gordon Sondland, who donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee, reportedly spent about the same amount of taxpayers’ money on renovations of his residence. Stroum’s “bullying and intimidating tactics” drove away most of the embassy’s senior staff, who curtailed their tours - many chose to go to war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan - the report said. A Democratic fundraiser whom then-President Barack Obama had sent to Luxembourg just 11 months earlier, Stroum found time during her short tenure to add a patio to the ambassador’s residence and spend “too many” of the embassy’s “limited resources” on personal needs, according to an inspector-general report. If ambassadors serve during the period between audits, they typically evade accountability.Īmong the unlucky ones was Cynthia Stroum, whose 2011 ouster became notorious for her brazen behavior. Appointees of both Republican and Democratic presidents have been fired in recent decades, but usually only after scathing criticism in audits by the Office of the Inspector General, which it conducts periodically at overseas posts. The only meaningful punishment a political ambassador can suffer while in office is dismissal - unlike a professional diplomat, whose career can bear various short- and long-term consequences. The State Department failed to reveal the cost of the renovations, new furniture and other expenditures associated with the house’s conversion, but sources involved in the process estimated the figure at around $1 million. A request for an interview with Marks received no response. As a result, even official spokesmen - the public affairs officers at the Pretoria embassy and the Cape Town consulate, Frank Whitaker and William Stevens, respectively - refused to answer any questions about Marks or the Cape Town residence. The dread Marks instilled in embassy and consulate staff, including the most senior officials, ran very deep, employees said. “It was extremely poor use of taxpayer money, and a very poignant example of excess,” said one diplomat, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution. consul-general in Cape Town was recently renovated for use as a second ambassadorial residence. consul general in Cape Town, evicting a family in the process. They said that the complaints against Marks involved mistreatment of career employees, demands and actions violating ethics rules and other regulations, as well as her insistence on taking over the residence of the U.S. Even though the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General has been looking into complaints from Marks’ former subordinates for months, the diplomats said, once political appointees leave office, the system provides for no accountability or consequences. Marks’ case is the latest example of how ambassadors owing their positions entirely to political connections can abuse their power with impunity. At the same time, however, the State Department granted her extraordinary approval to remain in the primary ambassadorial residence in Pretoria and to keep her diplomatic status for another two months, even though she no longer works for the U.S. A political appointee with no previous experience in diplomacy, Marks stepped down following President Biden’s inauguration, as required, and her resignation was accepted.
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