Researcher Fired At NSF After Government Questions Her Role As 1980s Activist

sciencehabit writes Valerie Barr was a tenured professor of computer science at Union College in Schenectady, New York, with a national reputation for her work improving computing education and attracting more women and minorities into the field. But federal investigators say that Barr lied during a routine background check about her affiliations with a domestic terrorist group that had ties to the two organizations to which she had belonged in the early 1980s. On 27 August, NSF said that her 'dishonest conduct' compelled them to cancel her temporary assignment immediately, at the end of the first of what was expected to be a 2-year stint. Colleagues who decry Barr's fate worry that the incident could make other scientists think twice about coming to work for NSF. In addition, Barr's case offers a rare glimpse into the practices of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), an obscure agency within the White House that wields vast power over the entire federal bureaucracy through its authority to vet recently hired workers.

Comments

Wrong Title

[mythosaz]

Researcher Fired At NSF After Government Finds She Lied On Her Routine Background Check

Re:Wrong Title

[plover]

I was a member of my high school's student parliament but wouldn't think to report that during a background check and wouldn't consider it any more relevant than what this woman did thirty years ago.

Was your high school's student parliament dedicated to the violent overthrow of the US government? Don't you think that's maybe the kind of student activity you might find rather difficult to forget? Then it's probably not the same thing.

Re:Wrong Title

[Bartles]

Let's see some examples of violent Tea Party activity.

Re:Wrong Title

[Anonymous Coward]

Researcher Fired At NSF After Government Finds She Lied On Her Routine Background Check

Come on now. They asked her whether or not she was in any organizations that plotted against the US. She wasn't. But she is apparently in trouble because she was in organizations that may have been tangentially related to a terrorist organization in that some people from one group spoke with bad people a few times. So that's really stretching it on the Gov's part.

Then it turns out that she's a (lesbian) liberal college professor. And people involving in the ruling had blogs with cartoons about...conservatives punching "typical" liberal college professors in the face because they were speaking against creationism. So there is some concern that there just might have been some bias involved here.

Re:Wrong Title

[gstoddart]

Horseshit.

She didn't lie.

Have you ever known anybody who has committed a crime? Then you must be a criminal.

That's about the level of reasoning going on in this. She did NOT work for any such agency, she worked for a rights group, which some of the members were involved in another organization ... and that organization was doing illegal things.

This is guilt by association, pure and simple. There's no evidence to suggest she lied, only that an overzealous moron decided that her not making the connection to people she knew who knew other people who did things she didn't know or approve of therefore means she "lied".

This is pure and unadulterated crap.

So, if you have worked in the same building with anybody with a felony conviction (even if it happened after you were no longer there), then you by extension must also be a felon.

Tell me, have you stopped beating your wife?

Re:Wrong Title

[RightwingNutjob]

Again, baloney. The US constitution explicitly enumerates your right to *peaceably* advocate for the overthrown of the US government. The background check forms ask about *violent* overthrow. I hope for your sake you understand the difference and aren't so blinkered by your conspiracy theories to discount the former.

Re:Wrong Title

[Anonymous Coward]

The report is pretty clear.

In her original interview, she denies involvement:

During that session, Barr answered “no” when asked if she had ever been a member of an organization “dedicated to the use of violence” to overthrow the U.S. government or to prevent others from exercising their constitutional rights.

Then, they actually checked what they told the interviewers. Despite being a self-described "worker bee," she had been involved with a groups actively dedicated to the use of violence to overthrow the government.

You can argue that she wasn't involved enough, or that the association was too distant, but she lied (by omission, at minimum), and that's what she got fired for.

No matter how you spin it, the headline in wrong.

No. She was a member of two groups (with no violent agenda) which OPM claims had ties to a separate, third group that did have a violent agenda. That's guilt by association -- i.e., You were a member of group. Other members of that group were associated with a separate group that did bad things. Therefore you're a bad person.

Last I checked, guilt by association was practiced by authoritarian regimes bent on maintaining their political power, not a free country. Oh, wait....

Re:Wrong Title

[gstoddart]

the OPM ask you in plain English "have you ever belonged to an organization dedicated to the violent overthrow of the US government" and these forms are retained by the OPM for something like 7 or 10 years, after which you are required to resubmit them. If she said "no" to the question in question, but knew that her acquaintances went to jail, something objectively doesn't add up

There is precisely zero logic in what you say, and if you don't know it, you should.

She worked for an organization which most certainly did NOT have a dedication to any of those things.

People who were also a member of that organization were members of a separate organization, which did. She did not make the connection, because in her mind the answer was emphatically "no, I certainly have not".

By your extension, if your pastor is caught fiddling with kiddies, you must be a rapist.

You sick bastard, why do you need to molest children? You should be castrated.

See, that's about the same a what you just said.

The best possible excuse is that she's just pathologically oblivious, not that the OPM has trumped up charges out of nowhere.

Or, you know, people she had a tangential relationship in an organization dedicated to one thing also had ties to people in another organization doing something else.

It's guilt by very indirect association, pure and simple. And, since they're not establishing guilt or innocence, they're saying she's politically tainted because of a tangential relationship.

But, hey, Bush was in business with the family of OBL ... so he was a terrorist too, right?

Give us a break.

Re:Wrong Title

[maroberts]

I doubt she had any idea that the third group even existed. Not sure what to think, except her response must not have been to their liking.

Sucks to be her.

At the time she filled in the form, she was obviously aware the third group existed as she had written to and visited one of its members in prison.

It is fairly obvious that her relationship with the "terrorist" organisation was very tenuous, but one point of a background check is a test of your willingness to be full and open about your past. In fact if she had given a full open answer, I suspect there would not have been a problem.

Despite conspiracy theories to the contrary, government agencies do not know everything about you. A background check will not necessarily find out everything about your past, but if it detects evasive answers then it is grounds for not employing someone in case there is more the potential employee is not telling or deliberately hiding.

Re:Wrong Title

[Geoffrey.landis]

The report is pretty clear. In her original interview, she denies involvement:

During that session, Barr answered “no” when asked if she had ever been a member of an organization “dedicated to the use of violence” to overthrow the U.S. government or to prevent others from exercising their constitutional rights.

Then, they actually checked what they told the interviewers. Despite being a self-described "worker bee," she had been involved with a groups actively dedicated to the use of violence to overthrow the government.

Nope. Actually read the article, instead of just skimming. The two groups that she was involved with in the 1980s were not "dedicated to the use of violence to overthrow the U.S. government." That was a different group, which OPM said "had ties" to the organizations she'd belonged to. She wasn't a member of the third group, or, as far as I can tell, the OPM doesn't claim she was.

I don't know what "had ties" means. But, was she a member of a group dedicated to the use of violence to overthrow the government: apparently not.

Re:Wrong Title

[Fwipp]

Doesn't mean that she "belonged to an organization dedicated to the violent overthrow of the US government," which is what they're accusing her of.

What do you think she's guilty of?

Re:Wrong Title

[14erCleaner]

But, hey, Bush was in business with the family of OBL ... so he was a terrorist too, right?

And, as the Republicans used to repeatedly hammer us over the head with, Obama was a member of an organization that included Weather Underground co-founder Bill Ayers. While I'm no supporter of Bush, this kind of thing could get almost anybody.

Re:Wrong Title

[ShanghaiBill]

Advocating peacable overthrow is completely ineffective ...

It is ineffective because it is supported by less than 2%. That is how many people typically vote for someone other than the two party hegemony. Most of those voted for either the Libertarians or the Greens, which have completely opposite views on almost every issue. If you want to overthrow "the system" you need to figure out what you intend to replace it with, and convince more than a tiny fringe to support you.

Re:Wrong Title

[mythosaz]

Perhaps if she had disclosed being prison pen-pals with one of the armored truck robbery murders from M19CO we wouldn't be discussing it.

That's probably "had ties," I guess.

Re:Wrong Title

[sillybilly]

Russia or USSR or the Soviet Union is notoriously more violent against all kinds of people, including their own people, than the USA or any of its past governments ever were. For instance, during the Stalinist purges 40,000 military officers were executed point blank. What a waste of talent, executing the best of the best of a population? I have yet to see the US government do anything like that, "purges," executing the best of the best in anything, on a massive scale, but the tone of the government is slowly shifting in such a direction.

Re:Wrong Title

[DrJimbo]

I think she may be telling the truth but omitting the fact that she was continuing to contact those two is enough for them to take action.

How is it her fault they asked her the wrong question? Do you now have to be psychic to work for the NSF? They asked if she belonged to any groups "dedicated to the use of violence". She answered the question honestly. Do you really think she should have interpreted that question to mean "ever visit a dying person in jail who was convicted of murder"?

I think the OPM falsely claimed they rejected her for lying because the real reason tramples on her constitutional right to free association. The original question was about whether she herself ever had a personal dedication to the use of violence. I believe this is relevant to her suitability to work for the government. The unconstitutional question they did not ask, about her free associations, is not relevant by order of the Constitution of the United States of America.

Answering the question that was actually asked should be very easy for the vast majority of people. They need only search their own hearts. Answering the unasked question is much more difficult because you have to recall all of the people you have ever had an association with and search their hearts. It makes no sense for her to spend an hour (or ten minutes or whatever) to answer the very simple question they asked her.

To me it seems like the particular special agent who questioned her was effectively judging her on one question:

[ ] Are you now or have you ever been a liberal?

This is disturbing.

Re:Wrong Title

[ZosX]

Guilt by association is a terrible and dangerous thing.

Re:Wrong Title

[gstoddart]

Care to cite where I accused you of any such thing?

I didn't accuse you of accusing me of anything. I'm saying in the abstract, that flagging those answers as untrustworthy is asinine and an utter fail in logic.

Oh? And you've been on the receiving end of such Q's and know their mental processes? I haven't... so I can't say either way.

As a matter of fact, I have. To the best of my knowledge, they didn't inject their own stuff into my answers. They must not have, because I passed the screening.

I'm taking exception with the massive amount of idiocy and failure of logic inherent in:

Example: An old college of mine is now a feeder to a couple of government agencies which give out a few scholarships each year... which in turn require a background check. One of the questions that screws up most kids is "Have you ever illegally downloaded any music or movies from the internet?" (or something to that effect).

Most kids put "no"... not wanting to admit wrong doing... but by doing so end up raising a flag that they may not be the most trustworthy as it's rather unlikely given their age and background (those applying for these scholarships).

Because if that's what these people are actually doing, I weep for the complete stupidity we've become subject to.

Because, really, if there are entities who take an honest answer and assume it's implausible, and therefore the respondent is untrustworthy, they're probably useless at their job.

Re:Wrong Title

[wiredlogic]

What do you think she's guilty of?

Believing that she lives in a free country.

Re: Wrong Title

[brianerst]

Jared Loughner (the man who shot Rep. Gabby Giffords) was a paranoid schizophrenic who was described by a classmate as being a hardcore leftist prior to manifesting his disease. Once his disease took hold, he became obsessed by conspiracies and hated all politicians but mostly the ones he knew of, like George W. Bush and Rep. Giffords. He was in no way a "tea partier" and had no knowledge of the "target ad."

Jared Loughner was a mentally ill person who tried to kill his local Congresswoman (among others). Had G. W. Bush or John McCain have been there, he would have shot them too. He was no more a tea partier than John Hinckley was an anti-Reagan Democrat. They were just both mentally ill and violent.

Re:Wrong Title

[nbauman]

If you look at the other documents that you find on the Internet about the Women's Committee Against Genocide, you'll see that many of them are involved in filmmaking.

This flyer is for a film series. The film series is jointly sponsored by the Moncada Library. So we don't know whether this is written by the Women's Committee or the Moncada Library.

The problem here is guilt by association. There's nothing to actually show that they or Barr were advocating violence. I bet the OPM is doing similar Google searches and drawing similar unsupported associations. At least you know your limits.

Filmmakers who run film series don't necessarily agree with the politics of the films they show. I ran a film series once and I showed Birth of a Nation, Triumph of the Will, and Potemkin. So would you conclude that I'm a KKK member, a Nazi, and a Communist? If I were applying for a job at the National Institutes of Health, and they asked me whether I had ever belonged to an organization that advocated overthrowing the government by violence, am I supposed to say, "No, but I showed Potemkin in my college film series"?

Snowden

[Baby Duck]

FTA:

Cohen speculates that the massive leaks by Edward Snowden of national security secrets, which began in June 2013, could also have been a factor in NSF’s decision. “If it’s a matter of weighing the employee’s statement against what the investigator says he has found, agencies will resolve it in favor of national security,” Cohen says. “That’s just how it is, especially after Snowden.”

Confirmed my suspicion when I first read the summary. THIS will be the lasting legacy of Snowden's actions. Not increased government accountability or transparency, but a hellbent determination to make sure they will never be caught with their pants down again. Sigh.

I need definitions

[hedgemage]

First off, what is a "Domestic terrorist group" and who makes the decision. Second, what are 'ties'? She was a member of 2 organizations that had 'ties' to a 'domestic terrorist group'. Does this mean financial or material support or that Joe Blow was also a member of the groups involved and therefore he was a 'tie'. Lastly, what was her 'dishonest conduct'? If she outright lied, that's one thing. If during her interviews/form filling she was asked if she had 'ties' (there's that slippery word again!) to any terrorist group if she honestly didn't know group X was considered a 'domestic terrorst group' when she wasn't even a member of group X and was instead a member of group Y which was NOT a 'domestic terrorist group' is that justifiable grounds for dismissal?

James Clapper

[Alain Williams]

So why was he not fired when he was found to have lied under oath to congress ?

McCarthy was right.

[mveloso]

Well, in the end McCarthy was right. How about that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...

Re:Good we don't need no stinkin commies

[gstoddart]

Maybe I live in some alternate reality or something, but I don't see a problem with this lady getting the boot if she signed the paperwork and either misrepresented her past, failed to remember it, or neglected to disclose it and the investigation turns up something different.

So, by your ridiculous logic, if you have ever worked at a place and co-worker was ever convicted of a crime, you too are a criminal?

Because, really, that's what's being described here.

So, can I conclude that all Catholics are pedophiles because some Catholics are pedophiles?

There is no substance to the statement she lied, because she wasn't involved in a group which was dedicated to any of those things. She was involved in a group fighting for women's rights, and encountered people who were much more radical.

Re:why are you volunteering information?

[reve_etrange]

She didn't volunteer any information. The agent leading the investigation found out about her past activism and then trumped up a reason to get rid of a lesbian with liberal political leanings, something he apparently found distasteful. He even has a blog in which he reposts comics advocating violence against atheists.

Yet Ollie North still got a job

[dbIII]

Yet Ollie North still got a government job after dealing with Hezbolla, Iran and a variety of bandits in Central America. Don't forget the embezzlement to buy a car and aircondition his house. His "club affiliation" bought him immunity from this sort of scrutiny.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Has /. turned into drudge?

[QuietLagoon]

When have sensationalist headlines become popular here on /. ? I've been seeing more and more provocative political headlines on this site.

.
I visit /. to get away from the drudge-type sites.

Are these topics indicative of the course the new owners of /. are taking, now that they have found out they cannot change the look of the site?

You had to read further down the link

[s.petry]

Federal investigators say those groups were affiliated with a third, the May 19 Communist Organization (M19CO), that carried out a string of violent acts, including the killing of two police officers and a security guard during a failed 1981 robbery of a Brink’s truck near Nyack, New York.

She was not a member of a "terrorist group", but rather a member of groups claimed by someone to be affiliated. Further, the alleged acts of terrorism occurred a year after she was even involved in those 2nd hand groups.

According to the article, she did not lie either.

Federal investigators say those groups were affiliated with a third, the May 19 Communist Organization (M19CO), that carried out a string of violent acts, including the killing of two police officers and a security guard during a failed 1981 robbery of a Brink’s truck near Nyack, New York.

and

After again being asked if she had been a member of any organization that espoused violence, Barr was grilled for 4.5 hours about her knowledge of all three organizations and several individuals with ties to them, including the persons who tried to rob the Brink’s truck. (Four people were found guilty of murder in that attack and sentenced to lengthy prison terms, including Kathy Boudin, who was released in 2003 and is now an adjunct assistant professor of social work at Columbia University.) “I found out about the Brink’s robbery by hearing it on the news, and just like everybody else I was shocked,” she recalls.

Which of course corroborates her story more than the feds who removed her from the position.

In other words, yet another example of people abusing power.

Re:Don't lie

[bmajik]

The point is that lying is worse. If they find out, not only did you break a federal law, but you lied about breaking a federal law when applying for a government job that asks a bunch of pretty serious questions and explains the possible penalties for dishonesty.

Also, other posters have mentioned that she visited some of these group members while they were in jail for murder. You neglect to mention that hey, you're kind of friends with a murderer when you're interviewing for a government job?

I did an OPM interview for a friend who was joining the USAF and listed me as a reference. They are serious. They need to be.

This lady hung out with some dipshits when she was younger. She probably hung out with them a bit too much. Then when she was older she tried to get a grown up adult type job that uncle sam was interested in. She either lied or neglected to mention her 2 or 3 standard deviations out of bounds youthful activities. OPM caught up with her on it and decided that she wasn't worth the risk.

It's their prerogative. They're not in the don't-hurt-your-feelings business. They're not in the "forgive-the-stupid-mistakes-of-youth" business. They're in the business of assessing possible problems with people.

Re:Good we don't need no stinkin commies

[mrchaotica]

Alright, so since EVERYONE MUST answer "yes" to that question just on the off chance that some random acquaintance might have done something at some point... in that case, WTF is the point of bothering to ask the question?

Here's what convinced me she's right

[nbauman]

It's a he said/she said deal in which the special agent who was responsible for the interview didn't make a recording of the interview, and destroyed the notes afterwards. The agent just gave his own subjective impression of what she said. Why don't they make recordings?

It's also an interview by an agent who thinks it's funny to beat up liberal professors. I wouldn't trust him to make fair judgments about "liberals." He shouldn't be working in government.

FTA:

http://news.sciencemag.org/peo...

Barr was given a chance to appeal NSF’s decision, and on 11 August she submitted a letter stating that OPM’s summary report of its investigation “contains many errors or mischaracterizations of my statements.” (As is standard practice, agencies receive only a summary of the OPM investigation, not a full report, and lawyers familiar with the process say that an agent’s interview notes are typically destroyed after the report is written.)...

In her 11 August response, Barr questioned whether the special agent who conducted the investigation “can be an impartial evaluator of academic scientists, or anyone with liberal political beliefs.” As evidence, she points to a posting on a blog maintained by the agent, a veteran who served in Iraq, and his family. The item is a copy of a popular Internet meme about an incident that supposedly took place in an introductory college biology course.

According to the story, a “typical liberal college professor and avowed atheist” declares his intent to prove that there is no God by giving the creator 15 minutes to strike him from the podium. A few minutes before the deadline, a Marine “just released from active duty and newly registered” walks up to the professor and knocks him out with one punch. When the professor recovers and asks for an explanation, the Marine replies, “God was busy. He sent me.”

That agent may have served in Iraq, but he didn't serve to protect our freedom. He served to come back and establish a police state that's starting to adopt a lot of the characteristics of the Soviet Union.

There have been many prosecutions in which the government's star witness testified about the defendant's statements, and then the defense attorney found a tape and it turned out the defendant didn't say anything like that at all.

There's one reason why criminal investigators don't use recordings: So they can make up things and the defendant can't disprove them.

Re:Unchecked governmental BS

[mrchaotica]

The US government simply has acted like any other employer, in that it is selective in who it hires. What do you want them to do?

I want them to be a whole lot more restricted in what they can do than "any other employer," because they're not "any other employer," they're a goddamn government!

Governments should be held to a much higher standard than any natural person or private organization. There is no such thing as "equal rights" for governments; governments have no rights. Governments are always "guilty until proven innocent." Governments should not defend themselves -- governments should be the people's bitch. It is entirely reasonable for a government to be summarily dissolved by the governed, for any reason or no reason, with no recourse or argument. Anything otherwise is tyranny!

Okay, so that was a bit over-the-top, but I trust you got my point. More specifically, while the government should be allowed to be selective in terms of who it hires based on competency, it should not be allowed to be selective based on race, gender, age, political affiliation, favorite color, preference for vi vs. emacs or any other non-job-competency-related basis whatsoever.

Re:Don't lie

[Rich0]

So, DON'T LIE.

Giving an incorrect answer isn't a lie. Deliberately giving an incorrect answer is a lie.

How do I know if the math club I was in during college 20 years ago is now considered a terrorist organization?

This sort of thing is over the top.