Across the Atlantic, Richard Kemp, the former commander of British troops in Afghanistan, who worked for four years at 10 Downing Street for British Prime Minister Tony Blair, also denounced Baker’s
alleged act of retaliation.
“He is a highly respected analyst across the board,” Kemp said, referring to Lovinger. “The way he has been treated is deeply troubling.”
Lovinger, a GS-15 attorney and strategic foreign affairs analyst, successfully served at ONA for 12 years and each year received the highest possible “E” rating in his performance review. The “E” means
“exceptional” performance.
Lovinger was also the 2006 recipient of the “Secretary of Defense Exceptional Civilian Service Award,” the highest career award for civil servants in Office of Secretary of Defense.
But Baker poorly rated Lovinger in 2017, after he raised issues about the ONA’s reliance on outside contractors, including LTSG.
ONA is a highly-classified think tank housed within the office of the Secretary of Defense. It conducts sensitive strategic research, especially for the Defense Secretary, and the office is supposed to serve as a
model of performance. For 42 years, ONA was led solely by one director, Andrew Marshall, who Lovinger alleges initially authorized many of the sweetheart deals with outside contractors. Marshall retired
from ONA at the age of 93. Baker took the helm four months later.
IG Fine’s investigation into possible wrongdoing by Baker is being carried out by his “Investigations of Senior Officials Directorate.” That unit investigates “allegations of misconduct against the most senior
DoD officers (three-star and above and equivalents), senior officials in the Joint or Defense Intelligence Community, and members of the Senior Executive Service,” according to the latest IG semi-annual
report to Congress that is current as of March 31, 2017.
IG investigations under the Presidential Policy Directive-19 appear to be extremely rare.
From 2013 to 2017, only three case were confirmed under PPD-19 among the 239 cases the IG “substantiated” across all the military services and civilian Defense Department employees, according to the
IG’s semi-annual report.
Several IG investigators personally met with Lovinger for four and a half hours Oct. 5, examining the charges of how Baker retaliated against the analyst, according to Bigley. The original meeting was
expected to last no more than three hours. The IG office is formally attempting to determine if they need to intervene in the Baker case, according to a source with direct knowledge of the investigation. Fine’s
office customarily does not provide any public information about the pace of IG investigations.
The first inkling of retaliation against Lovinger came Jan. 12, 2017, when Baker suddenly issued a series of charges against him. This was the same day that the National Security Council officially invited
Lovinger to leave ONA and join the NSC as a senior director.
Lovinger entered the Trump White House on Inauguration Day, but was dogged by Baker.
After Baker issued his latest set of allegations against Lovinger, the Washington Headquarters Services, a bureaucratic arm of the Pentagon, temporarily suspended Lovinger’s security clearance May 1 and
removed him from his NSC post. Lovinger now works at a Defense Department annex where he currently is doing clerical work.
Baker dropped charges in two of the three of his initial investigations after they were challenged by Thomas Spencer, Lovinger’s first attorney. Bigley said the allegations against his client are “demonstrably
false” and called Baker “partisan and highly vindictive” in an interview.
Baker has leveled four separate charges against Lovinger. The counts include an “unauthorized” trip to Israel, taking home unclassified academic papers to read, reading a classified document in an airplane,
and having “unauthorized” contacts with the Indian government.
Baker’s accusation that the trip to Israel was “unauthorized” particularly rankles Lovinger.
Prior to the trip, Lovinger said that he notified ONA of an expected personal trip to Israel to commemorate his oldest son’s Bar Mitzvah. The Lovinger family traveled with their close family friends, the
Wiesel’s, whose patriarch, Elisha, is the son of legendary Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Eli Wiesel.
Lovinger said that they only did “tourist stuff” and did not meet with a single Israeli official.
Another charge is that Lovinger conducted “unauthorized” contacts with the Indian government.
Lovinger’s 2017 performance review includes a statement from Secretary Carter, commending him for his work with the Indian government. “Two days prior to departing for the NSC, on January 18, 2017,
the Secretary of Defense highlighted in an official letter Lovinger’s exceptional performance on collaborative net assessment with the Government of India,” the performance review states.
Nevertheless, in the same review Baker rated Lovinger poorly. “I do not endorse the characterization set forth in the employee input (that) Adam performed successfully,” Baker said.
As for taking home papers, Baker sent an email to all ONA staff Nov. 1, 2016, in which he said, “Team-…acknowledging our cluttered workspace: we all read widely and have to as part of the job — all
source, often all mixed together. Given the volume of reading, you may sometimes take reports and so forth home. (I certainly do).”
Lovinger did carry a document aboard an airplane during a Sept. 14, 2016 official trip. Anthony Russell, the ONA investigator of the incident, noted in an Oct. 18 memo for the record that the document “is
marked without security markings in the header, but with ‘Classification Pending.'” Russell concluded: “It is reasonable to conclude that there was no compromise given the content of the document in
question and its close control either on Mr. Lovinger’s person or in his assigned lodging on a military base for a relatively short period of time. For these reasons, no violation is believed to have occurred.”
“He clearly was the target, for political reasons, of an effort to push him out of government,” Perle said of Lovinger. “And this was done consciously and deliberately. He’s a Trump loyalist, and it was
launched and sustained by an Obama holdover.”
“This cries out for an investigation of Baker,” Perle added. Kemp called the sidelining of Lovinger “a great loss.” “He is very much a creative thinker and he’s not constrained by sort of narrow lines that
affect so many people in government,” Kemp said.
“As I understand it, he questioned the actions of various organizations within the U.S. Government, particularly the Office of Net Assessment. And of course, these may not be always welcomed by one’s
superiors,” Kemp said. As for the use of outside contractors, Kemp said, “I’m aware they [ONA] did depend a lot on in the past on external contractors. It’s not necessarily a good thing.” “To get rid of
someone like that on what appeared to be questionable grounds is potentially problematic for the effectiveness of the U.S. intelligence organization,” Kemp added.
Robert Reilly, who served for 25 years in the national security field, including as a senior advisor to Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and as a White House special assistant to Reagan said, “I’m very familiar with
the use of investigations to politically destroy people.” “That they would yank a top security clearance on what seemed to be unsubstantial grounds is shocking,” Reilly said.
Reilly also said he didn’t think the punishment fit the crime for Lovinger, and that it appeared Lovinger committed insignificant security infractions. “There’s a disproportion here that immediately raises
suspicions,” he said. “What was the crime and how does the punishment fit the crime?” Heather Babb, a public affairs officer who spoke on behalf of ONA stated in an email, “As a matter of policy, we do not
comment on current investigations.”
The David and the DOE Case -
The United States Department of Energy Inspector General, The FBI and the Pentagon’s Inspector General have now been informed of over one thousand retaliation, reprisal and vendetta attacks against those
who reported corruption during the Obama Administration. Another case involves a California man and his technology team.
“David” has been employed since 1973. He worked for his community and his country as a law enforcement and intelligence researcher (law/IC) in which he closed cases that saved Americans billions of
dollars. He held numerous state and federal certifications and credentials to this effect and was certified as an investigator under the State Government at the California Office Of Consumer Affairs. He also
worked as a CEO, Inventor and Product Development Director for which the U.S. Government has awarded him dozens of seminal patent awards for products in use by Microsoft, Sony and other major
companies to provide products and services to billions of people. He has received a vast number of commendation letters from U.S. Presidents, Agency heads and Mayors. He is pictured in videos,
photographs, articles, meetings and personal correspondence with some of the most famous public and White House figures in America.