Joseph E. Schmitz

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Joseph E. Schmitz bigraphy, stories - American businessman

Joseph E. Schmitz : biography

August 28, 1956 –

Joseph Edward Schmitz (born on August 28, 1956 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin)U.S. Congress. Senate. Committee on Armed Services, Nominations before the Senate Armed Services Committee, first session, 107th Congress, 1616 is an American lawyer, former Inspector General of the Department of Defense and a former executive with Blackwater Worldwide, a private contractor providing security services to the U.S. State Department and the U.S. military.

Inspector General of the Department of Defense

Schmitz was nominated by President George W. Bush to be Defense Department Inspector General on June 18, 2001. His nomination was held up in the Senate Armed Services Committee for unknown reasons until March 21, 2002 , when he was confirmed by the full Senate by voice vote. One of his first actions as Inspector General was to hire controversial republican operative L. Jean Lewis as his chief of staff.

Allegations and Resignation

Although Senator Charles Grassley published numerous allegations against Inspector General Schmitz toward the end of his almost four-year tenure as the Senate-confirmed Inspector General of the Department of Defense, none of those allegations was ever substantiated. All of Senator Grassley’s allegations were investigated by an independent Office of Inspector General under the auspices of the Integrity Committee of the President’s Council on Integrity & Efficiency (PCIE), which on October 19, 2006, “concluded that there was no wrongdoing.”Executive Council on Integrity and Efficiency, Letter to Joseph E. Schmitz, , October 23, 2006 [Citation: PCIE Integrity Committee Fax to PCIE Chairman, October 19, 2006. See also, “Corrections,” The Washington Post, p. A02, November 20, 2010 (clarifying that its prior article about Inspector General Schmitz, “failed to state that Schmitz was exonerated of any wrongdoing by the Integrity Committee of the President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency in 2006“).]

Schmitz resigned as Defense Department Inspector General on September 9, 2005 in the wake of allegations that he intervened to obstruct the FBI investigation of fellow Bush appointee to the Department of Defense John A. Shaw in relation to contracting improprieties in Iraq for which Shaw was fired in December 2004.T. Christian Miller, Pentagon Investigator Resigning, , Los Angeles Times, September 3, 2005T. Christian Miller, Pentagon Ousts Official Under FBI Investigation, , Los Angeles Times, December 11, 2004 The allegations also included interference in the investigation of Mary L. Walker’s role in the Torture Memos scandal and Schmitz’s redaction of an investigative report on Boeing to remove the names of White House officials before sending it to congress. In addition to serious questions regarding Schmitz’s independence from the White House, Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) also submitted complaints that Schmitz had accepted a trip to South Korea paid for by a former lobbying client and similarly obtained eight tickets to a Washington Nationals basketball game.Congressional Record of the 109th Congress, First Session, No. 122, page 35, U.S. Government Printing Office, September 27, 2005,

In a letter dated June 15, 2005, and posted on the Inspector General’s website on September 2, 2005, Schmitz recused himself from investigating all matters related to Blackwater. After resigning, Schmitz took a position with the Prince Group, a holding company for Blackwater Worldwide, which provides security services and training to the U.S. military in Iraq and elsewhere. The Congressional Record states that "Congressional aides … are still scratching their heads about how Schmitz got his job."

Biography

Joseph Edward Schmitz is the son of the John G. Schmitz, former California State Senator, member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and U.S. Presidential candidate (1972). Schmitz attended Catholic schools as a child and Georgetown Preparatory School while his father served in Congress. He holds a Bachelor of Science (1978) from the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland and a Juris Doctor (1986) from Stanford University. He was on the wrestling team at the Naval Academy. His siblings include Mary Kay Fualaau, Jerome Thomas Schmitz and John Patrick Schmitz.