Part Three: FMCS Executives Forced Whistleblower to Retract Fraud Complaint

Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service employees’ use of purchase cards amounted to rampant violation of federal procurement law, specialists say, and when an employee wrote to the General Services Administration to ask for a compliance review, the agency director and another top official forced her to send a “retraction,” according to documents reviewed by the Washington Examiner.

The FMCS is a small agency whose sole purpose is to mediate labor-management conflicts.

When accountant Carol Booth became concerned about luxury goods being delivered to employees’ homes, spending on unnecessary services and indifference to federal regulations, she sought help from the GSA, which oversees federal purchase cards, writing that “it has come to my attention that we, the FMCS, have violated several rules, regulations and/or laws concerning the government-issued purchase card program.”

That infuriated FMCS director George H. Cohen and chief financial officer Frances L. Leonard, who together sought to evade outside scrutiny by helping compose a retraction to which Booth would sign her name…

Part three of a five-part Washington Examiner series, “Just Sign Here: Federal Workers Max Out at Taxpayer Expense.” See the entire series — and FMCS workers’ salaries — at this link.

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