Report: Former director of USAGM abused office, wasted $1.6m

The first executive director appointed by the president at the head of the United States Global Media Agency (USAGM) violated the agency's internal regulation guaranteeing editorial independence, was involved in major abuse of public funds and abused his authority, a 145-page report published by the Special Prosecutor's Office said on Wednesday. America's voice is part of USAGM.

The Special Prosecutor's Office (OSC) is an independent agency whose role is to investigate violations within the federal government. This agency, it signaled. USAGM in December 2020 on a series of counts of violations under the direction of Mr. Michael Pack and demanded the launch of investigations. USAGM engaged in this investigation by three independent experts, experienced in defence, which is guaranteed to internal signals as well as to journalists.

Experts' Report, which was presented to the Special Prosecutor's Office, found clues to major mismanagement in two cases. The report says that Executive Director Pack was involved in major abuse when he spent $1.6 million funding on an unnecessary contract with a private legal firm and that he did not respect the journalistic independence and the integrity of the networks for which it was assigned to oversee.

Mr. Pack, with conservative political conviction, former documentary film professor, was appointed by former President Donald Trump to the post of head of the agency overseeing six independent news networks and other entities, including the Voice of America. Seven months after taking office, he resigned in January 2021, at the request of President Joe Biden.

The independent report focuses on six areas, given complaints coming from beacons within the agency.

The three independent investigators conducted 78 interviews, 64 of them with employees and former employees of its agency or networks. Investigators also sought to conduct interviews with Mr. Pack and 13 senior political team officials, as well as with officials appointed by Mr. Pack as directors of these networks. Requests were rejected and received no answers, except for two cases.

The report also publishes correspondence between the Special Prosecutor's Office and Mr. Pack, when he was still in office of executive director, through whom O The SC noted that the possibilities of breaking the law were great. The report says Mr. Pack told investigators that the charges did not deserve to be taken into consideration because the “beacons were initiated by personal interests”.

Some of the report's findings

The report concludes that Mr. Pack abused office in the following cases:

• He unjustly suspended the security certificates of six executive executives and a manager “without having a legitimate cause”.
• He tried to remove the federal funds earmarked for the Open Technology Fund, which finances research work on avoiding censorship by foreign governments.
• He violated the International Broadcasting Law by trying to change sublaw acts and the working contracts of ring leaders appointed by the executive director.
• He violated the Law on Privateity by instructing that material related to employees was sent to individuals outside the agency. The independent report notes that Mr. Pack did so, though an outside legal firm told him that the move was in violation of the law.

Great mistake:

• Mr. Pack transferred the editor responsible for the journalistic standards of the Voice of America, responsible for maintaining and implementing the rules of journalistic ethics, to another task. The report says that this action prevented the editor from answering questions from American Voice journalists about their work, as well as to organise a seminar on ethics rules for election reporting, in recent months ahead of the campaign for the 2020 presidential elections.
• He spent $1.6 million funding on a legal firm that would investigate personnel when this job could have been done by the federal agency itself.
• He took actions that were not in line with the obligation set out in the statute for the executive director to respect the independence and journalistic integrity of the networks.

Independent report: Mr. Pack violated “laws, regulations and regulations”, as follows:

• A directive restricting the agency's external communications did not take into account that W SAGM has the legal obligation to inform the State Department and other entities.
• He violated the Act on Privateity, the day before he resigned, when a senior adviser -- whose name has been erased in the report -- gave some people, who are not part of the government -- an investigative material linked to six directors of the agency.
• His deputy in office, which covered legal issues, enforcement of regulations and risk management, (whose name has been erased) has violated regulations on data storage, not preserving official communications, or communicating via encrypted messages apps, which disappear.

The violation of the Private Act could amount to an offense that envisions a fine sentence of up to $5,000.

Officials who conducted the investigations also determined that some of the complaints made by the beacons could not be seen as cases of mismanagement or abuse by Mr. Pack.

These include decisions on the removal of broadcast networks, changing board members, freezing work contracts, or even new employment, use for other purposes of Congress funds, and refusing to approve, or renew J-1 visas for foreign journalists working for the agency.

In the case of visas, the independent report notes that Mr. Pack failed to consider the impact his actions would have on the ability of the Voice of America to report news in several languages. He offered no possible alternative to employ foreign journalists. While still in office, Mr. Pack had promised to explain what basis he made his decision, which he never did. Mr. Pack failed to respond to American Voice requests Wednesday to comment on this article.

David Seide, senior adviser to the Government Accounting Organization, a non-profit organisation that protects the signalers, which represents about 30 such ones when Mr. Pack held the position of chief executive of USAGM, points to the impartial, two-party nature of the Special Prosecutor's Office, and calls the report <x0Bevatory from his extension<1>.

said that reports of this nature, are so profound and enter so many details “when the Special Prosecutor's Office knows that the organisation's integrity under investigation is at risk and when the world must prove that efforts are being made to address the issue with impartiality and by doing an objective analysis of”.

While calling the report depleting, Mr. Seide said more must be done, including the reference of several cases to the Justice Department for further investigation.

In a statement Wednesday, the current chief executive of the United States Agency for Global Media (USAGM), Amanda Bennett, welcomed the investigation process and its results.

“When I became executive director in October 2022, I vowed to focus on the USAGM mission, as one of the largest global media operations in the world, with a strong editorial wall and higher journalistic standards”, said Mrs. Bennett, a veteran journalist, who previously led the Voice of America.

“Agency has undertaken a series of corrective actions and reforms to address many of the issues identified by the independent investigation team. We're going to continue this”, she said.

In a letter to President Biden accompanying the release of the report, Special Prosecutor's Office Director Henry J. Kerner says the <x0 ...raport largely confirmed the deeply disturbing actions, discovered by the beacons. However, I am encouraged by the steps the agency has taken to carry out its duties and establish its reputation”.

Issues of Faith

The report describes in detail how Mr. Pack and his team believed employees on Congress-funded news networks were biased and unbelievable.

The team helping Mr. Pack drafted a list involving some senior federal agency officials, who were to be dismissed, naming them as representatives of the so-called “secret state”, which “were not reliable”.

Pack took concrete action on some of these “legal basis” after they had signalled possible violations, according to the report.

On June 5, 2020, Mr. Pack met with an official whose name is not identified in the report, who had compiled a list of people to be removed”.

In this document and some post-mails, the official had included alleged political links to these people by accompanying comments such as “elemening the entire anti-Trump team”, “run Republicans and Trump” or: “is on the Trump” team.

Some of the biggest concerns during the time when Mr. Pack led the USAGM are related to efforts to abolish the internal regulation guaranteeing the editorial independence of the Voice of America, protecting it from political interference.

In November 2020, a federal judge issued a preliminary order banning officials from interfering with editorial independence and the rights facing American Voice journalists based on the First Amendment of the Constitution.

In an assessment of Mr. Pack's failure to respect editorial independence, his conflicting actions are cited in the independent report. Mr. Pack instructed a political appointee to investigate a video of the Urdu Service, the Voice of America, which was viewed as partisan but took no action when it was announced that the Office of Broadcasting for Cuba gave a White House official, a material (film) regarding a group supporting then President (Mr. Trump). The official emailed the material to an internal American audience two months before the 2020 elections. Under the agency's rules, USGM journalists have the obligation to take all measures so that the content of their materials is not distributed for internal audiences.

Pack also failed to take action or intervene when his newly appointed head of the Voice of America, Robert Reilly, retaliated against White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara, after she asked the “a logical question to the Secretary of State”. Mr. Reilly had invited then Secretary Mike Pompeo to attend a questioning session in the Voice of America, but he didn't ask Mr. Pompeo, none of the questions the agency's journalists had posed. Mrs. Widakuswara then asked Mr. Pompeo a question as he left the Voice of America building.