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THREAD-‘Fortress Mentality’ Grips Trump Labor Agency as Critics Circle news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-re… by @benjaminpenn
"In early 2018, members of the U.S. Department of Labor’s senior political staff arrived at work to discover their security codes to get into Secretary Alexander Acosta‘s executive suite no longer worked. Around the same time, some appointees lost access to Acosta’s calendar.
"Most political employees within DOL previously enjoyed unfettered entry to the expansive chambers. In fact, the door was often left ajar. But from that winter day forward, no more than perhaps seven people—members of Acosta’s inner circle—knew the new code.
"Anyone else had to ask an assistant stationed outside his door for permission to go in. Others started pulling favors to see what was Acosta’s schedule for a particular day.
“It is a fortress mentality. They don’t trust anyone else. Not just a senior career; they don’t trust anybody,” a current senior Trump official in the department said. “It seeps through the organization and that’s why the morale is low.”
"An expanded policy office reporting to Acosta has consolidated power and effectively sidelined top lawyers and career civil servants at agencies that write rules and enforce laws protecting workers according to interviews with about 20 current and former Trump DOL employees."
"The limits on access symbolize Acosta’s moves over the last year to tighten control as much of his final authority on high-priority rulemaking has been usurped by acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney...
"... and as 19 House Democrats have called on him to resign over a decade-old plea deal he struck as a federal prosecutor with billionaire and accused sex trafficker #JeffreyEpstein."
