Pompeo denies retaliation but won't explain watchdog ouster

Pompeo took an unusually harsh shot at the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez. Pompeo accused the senator's office of being behind allegations that Linick's ouster was motivated by revenge. Pompeo said he would not take ethics lessons from Menendez, who was the subject of a now-dismissed criminal ethics investigation.

Pompeo told reporters that he was unaware of any inspector general investigation into allegations that he may have mistreated staffers by instructing them to run personal errands for him and his wife. Thus, Pompeo said, it would have been impossible for retaliation to have been the motive behind his recommendation to President Donald Trump to dismiss Linick.

Pompeo said he had been concerned about the inspector general's work for some time and that he regretted not calling for his dismissal earlier. "I recommended to the president that Steve Linick be terminated," he said. "I frankly should have done it some time ago." Linick was an Obama administration appointee whose office was critical of what it saw as political bias in the State Department's current management but had also taken issue with Democratic appointees. He also played a minor role in the Ukraine impeachment investigation into Trump.

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