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March 13, 2009
An Obama Official on Leave After FBI Raids
Obama official on leave after FBI raids
WASHINGTON
An aide to President Barack Obama is on leave from his White House job after the FBI raided his old District of Columbia government office Thursday, arresting a city employee and a technology consultant on corruption charges, a White House official said.
The charges were lodged against the two men at a federal court hearing as the FBI finished searching the city's technology office, which was led until recently by Obama's new computer chief, Vivek Kundra.
Kundra is on leave from his White House job until further details of the case become known, according to a White House official speaking on condition of anonymity because the official did not want to publicly discuss personnel matters.
At the court hearing, Yusuf Acar, the acting chief security officer in the city's technology office, was ordered held without bond pending a hearing Tuesday. Prosecutors said $70,000 in cash was found during a search of Acar's Washington home and that he posed a serious flight risk.
Technology consultant Sushil Bansal of Dunn Loring, Va., was released but was ordered not to conduct overseas financial transactions or leave the Washington metropolitan area. Bansal is due back in court on April 21, and prosecutors said they were hopeful that a plea agreement could be reached in his case.
Acar worked under Kundra, Obama's pick to coordinate federal computer systems. Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs would not say whether the White House knew the investigation was under way when it named Kundra last week, but called the case "a serious matter."
Mafara Hobson, a spokeswoman for Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty, said she was "very confident" Kundra is not a target of the investigation.
Men and women dressed in suits and wearing latex gloves could be seen entering and leaving the glass-enclosed lobby of the Office of the Chief Technology Officer on Thursday afternoon.
Even as the raid was taking place, Kundra was giving a speech at FOSE, an annual government technology expo. Kundra said part of his focus is to change the way the government buys technologies from vendors.
from The Washington Post
In court documents released yesterday, FBI agent Andrew Sekela laid out the complicated and audacious schemes allegedly orchestrated by a mid-level manager who approved many contracts involving the city government's technology needs.
Authorities said the conspiracy was uncovered with the help of a D.C. government employee who recorded conversations with the executive and the city official.
The technology office was headed by Vivek Kundra, who has taken a job as President Obama's chief information officer. A White House official confirmed last night that Kundra has taken a leave of absence.
“Yusuf Acar, 40, who has worked in the technology office since 2004, was charged with bribery, conspiracy, money laundering and conflict of interest. Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Hibarger told a federal judge that Acar is a flight risk because agents seized $70,000 in cash in his house and because in recorded conversations, he boasted that he could easily flee to his native Turkey. Acar also told the informant that he could use computers to create fake D.C. birth certificates, Hibarger said.”
Wild Thing's comment......
Obama has not yet thrown him under the bus, but its warming up in the parking garage
This is weird, they said he wasn’t a target, so why not go to work??....hmmmmmmm.
So our White House/Executive Branch guy did NOT know that fraud was going on, right under his nose, in his DC job? And we are going to put THAT guy in charge of firewalls and Internet security for the entire White House??
He is either a crook, or an idiot, or both, don't you think?
This administration is sounding more and more like an episode of ‘24’!
Posted by Wild Thing at March 13, 2009 05:44 AM
Comments
This is what you get when nobody checks out the guy they want for president. All of his appointments are Tax cheats, crooks, double dealers, ...Gee, if obama were smart he could pardon Bernie Madoff, and make him treasury secretary. Bernie would fit right in with thie bunch.
Posted by: Mark at March 13, 2009 09:15 AM
My oldest friend, co-worker, and fishing buddy just died of a heart attack and the strain of reading the brutal truth on this blog may do it to me, but I'm not going to stop reading.
The difference in the soap opera that is the Zero's administration and "24" is that we lack a Jack Bauer, unless Rush is playing the role. If Rush is Jack he needs to ramp up the action. Maybe I'll call in to Rush and tell him that he's got the ball now, run with it. Steele isn't going to take us anywhere and Sarah is too far away and the dumb-ass daughters of both Sarah and McCain just give the enemy ammo.
Posted by: horace at March 13, 2009 11:05 AM
Mark, now there is an idea...Bernie Madoff. He would fit right in like you said.
Posted by: Wild Thing at March 13, 2009 07:15 PM
Horace, please stay well, I mean it, your friendship means a lot to me. We can't do anything about any of this stuff that is happening from the icky left.
I feel my blood boil when I write a rant but then I have to let it go and take a deep breath, think of the good things and how America is not like some European country, we are strong and we will survive, I know it. It will be a climb back but no way will these jerks do us or our country in the way they plan or wish to.
I am so sorry about your friend and co-worker.
Posted by: Wild Thing at March 13, 2009 07:20 PM
