The Obama administration’s Department of Labor (DOL) ignored an ethics complaint against one of its top officials.
After The Daily Caller reported that top DOL public affairs official Carl Fillichio violated separation of church and state by urging his workers to vote for a former DOL secretary in an online religious game called “Lent Madness,” the DOL inspector general’s office sent a letter to the DOL acting secretary requesting a review of the violation.
“If it is determined that this email was sent to DOL staff and/or using DOL computers, this would be an inappropriate use of government resources, and an inappropriate request by a senior level DOL official given the religious overtones of the email,” wrote DOL deputy inspector general Daniel Petrole in a letter to the acting secretary.
“We request that you review the complaint to determine whether any ethics or administrative violations occurred,” Petrole wrote, adding, “I request that the OIG be informed within 30 days what, if any, action you have taken to address this complaint. Once we receive your response, we will determine whether any further action is necessary on the part of the OIG.”
That was 17 months ago. No reprimand appears to have been made against Fillichio, who still works in DOL Secretary Thomas Perez’s office.
TheDC is currently banned from speaking to employees of the Department of Labor after breaking stories about the department’s wasteful spending and alleged racial discrimination and former DOL Secretary Hilda Solis’ illegal campaign fundraising trip for President Obama.
UPDATE: DOL sent TheDC a 2013 memo from the Secretary of Labor’s office explaining to the inspector general that the agency performed a review and “concluded that the activity described in the complaint did not violate any law, regulation, or policy” and “counseled Mr. Fillichio” on how his actions could have been seen to carry religious overtones.