Culture of Corruption: Pentagon Recalled Lewis’s(R-CA) Appropriations Staffer

The Pentagon has recalled Lt. Col. Carl Kime, a detailee who had worked nearly five years in the personal office of Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, much of that time in apparent violation of House and Department of Defense rules.

The Department of Defense reassigned Kime, an active Marine officer, after a report in The Hill raised questions about whether his service for Lewis broke congressional and military rules. Lewis had defended Kime as “one of the smartest detailees I’ve ever had in my office.”

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Kime held an influential position in Lewis’s personal office and had oversight on requests for earmarked funds in the defense appropriations bill, the largest of the annual spending bills, according to sources familiar with the workings of the House Appropriations Committee....

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“I’ve had military detailees since I’ve been in the Congress, almost every year, and they’ve been responsive to me,” {Lewis} said. “I don’t read the handbooks, but I know who they work for and they respond to my interests.”

Kime’s service also appeared to violate a Department of Defense regulation that mandates that detailees “be limited to performing duties for a specific duration, in a specific project and as a member of a staff of a committee of the Congress.”

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