S.O.S. (Stories of Service) - Ordinary people who do extraordinary work
This channel confronts power, exposes institutional failure, and gives a platform to people willing to tell the truth when silence is easier and safer. We cover the stories the military, media, and influencers would rather bury, because reform does not happen without friction.
S.O.S. (Stories of Service) - Ordinary people who do extraordinary work
DEI Controversy Meets Pentagon Whistleblowing Rick Lamberth | S.O.S. #250
A simple question opens a complicated story: what happens when you say no to a powerful directive that feels wrong? Rick joins us with 43 years of experience spanning infantry, war-zone logistics, and Pentagon program oversight to recount how refusing an alleged extortion scheme set off a cascade of retaliation, reassignment, and legal battles. The stakes are not just personal—this is about how procurement ethics, whistleblower protection, and culture shape national security and public trust.
We walk through his time in Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan, where he says he pushed back on inflated costs, substandard equipment, and pressure to rubber-stamp paperwork. Then we move to the Pentagon, where Rick describes a supervisor’s alleged attempt to steer work from one contractor to a competitor to prompt a payoff hidden as a cost overrun. He asked for the order in writing; it never came. Instead, he says doors closed, friendships and office politics complicated oversight, and a familiar pattern emerged: small write-ups, nitpicks about tone and attendance, and a transfer that led to new allegations of harassment and denied accommodations.
This conversation goes beyond headlines to examine how DEI can be misused when identity becomes a shield against scrutiny, why fewer veterans in key roles changes decision-making, and where contracting oversight often cracks under pressure. We dig into the alphabet soup—MSPB, OSC, EEOC, ADA—and how slow, costly processes can deter even the most committed public servants. The message is clear: real inclusion requires merit, transparency, and the courage to investigate quickly, document directives, and protect those who speak up. If you care about defense acquisition, government accountability, and protecting taxpayer dollars, this is a story you need to hear.
If this resonates, subscribe, share with a colleague, and leave a review with your take: how should agencies strengthen oversight and safeguard whistleblowers without politics?
Stories of Service presents guests’ stories and opinions in their own words, reflecting their personal experiences and perspectives. While shared respectfully and authentically, the podcast does not independently verify all statements. Views expressed are those of the guests and do not necessaril
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When you go to work in a job, the one thing that you want is you want to know that merit matters. You want to know that the person who is the most qualified and the person who knows how to create a measurable outcome and who makes a difference is the person who is in the right position. But sometimes that doesn't happen. And sometimes we have to have these very, very difficult conversations. And a lot of people don't understand DEI. They don't understand why it was wrong. They see it as we're just being inclusive, but they don't understand that there's a lot of repercussions that happen when we decide to prioritize identity over competence. And so that's what we're going to talk about today. And we're going to share a story that is not an easy story to share, but a story that needs to be told because we need to have these difficult conversations. And as I always say, when we have these difficult conversations, we get to the root of problems so that we can solve them. So, Rick, how are you doing today?
SPEAKER_02:Great, Teresa.
SPEAKER_01:Well, thank you so much for coming on. Welcome to the Stories of Service Podcast, ordinary people who do extraordinary work. I am the host of Stories of Service, Teresa Carpenter. And this is our 250th episode. We've been doing this now for a little over uh going on five years, I believe, uh, in April. So very, very honored to have you on and to continue to do this podcast. And as we always do, to get these shows started, we'll do an introduction from my father, Charlie Pickard.
SPEAKER_00:From the moment we're born and lock eyes with our parents, we are inspiring others. By showing up as a vessel of service, we not only help others, we help ourselves. Welcome to SOS Stories of Service, hosted by Teresa Carpenter, here from ordinary people from all walks of life who have transformed their communities by performing extraordinary work.
SPEAKER_01:And because this is such a sensitive issue, I also want to get started by saying that the views and the opinions on the Stories of Service podcast are those of the guests and the guest of loan. They do not represent the views of the broadcast, they don't represent necessarily my views, and I'm here to ask the questions and to get the story. If there are other sides to the story, which as there always are, please feel free to give me a call. But today we're going to be sharing Rick's story. And Rick says that he was pushed out of the civilian his civilian Pentagon job after he refused to go along with what he saw as unethical contracting directives and then labeled unacceptable and removed from service. And today this experience isn't just about him, it's big questions about accountability, retaliation, and whether the Pentagon's current culture, even today, truly serves merit and mission. Rick served 43 plus years in the U.S. Army and DoD from infantry and logistics in war zones to senior civilian roles overseeing major contracts. After reporting perceived fraud and resisting dubious orders, he says his performance record was suddenly tarnished and he was forced out March of 2025, which was a dramatic fall for a decorated career. And today we're going to talk about what he saw inside Pentagon contract oversight, how reporting concerns allegedly turned into retaliation, and what this story truly says about ethics, power, and culture at the top of DoD, and why sites like militarycorruption.com or my podcast is tracking these as a bar of a bigger problem of fraud, abuse, and the suppression of whistleblowers. Welcome again, Rick. So first, first off, as I always ask all of my guests, where were you born and raised and what made you decide to join the Army?
SPEAKER_02:I was born in uh a small town in Mississippi, Corinth, Mississippi. And um the vast majority of my family had served in the military. And um upon graduation from high school, um didn't have much prospects. Uh my father died when I was in the fifth grade. And uh the uncle had helped raise me. He was in World War II and uh Korean War. And uh I felt uh a debt of uh uh uh indebtedness to him and the country, and uh so I enlisted and uh it's just been an adventure since then. And uh I still that's why I love to have your father's introduction. I I still believe in selfless service, and through that we uh uh we gain more selfishly than than if we were purely selfish, as some of the things I've experienced in the Pentagon in the last few years.
SPEAKER_01:Right. Why did what did you join the army as? What was your original MOS? And then what did you and then you were, I know, a contracting officer as an officer, but what was your original enlisted uh MOS?
SPEAKER_02:Went through Fort Benning, Georgia and came out as an 11 Bravo uh infantryman. Uh did that for four years. Uh my first duty station was Germany, uh, 1981. I walked guard duty on the Czechoslovakian border during the Cold War, watched them through the Binos, watch us, and we watched them. And it was to keep uh it was to keep people in, it wasn't to keep people out. And um got back to uh got back to America and uh I was thinking about re-enlisting, and I had some great mentors, some uh senior non-commissioned officers and officers, and uh uh they convinced me to get out and go to college, go to RLTC, which I had had as aspirations of, but uh uh thanks to the GI Bill, I was able to and got commissioned as an armor officer. And did that for uh several years in the uh uh Mississipp National Guard and the uh later in the Army Reserve, a combat engineer and a uh logistician. And uh in about uh 2020, a correction, 2000 uh Jesus, in about 2000, I um was sent to school to be uh a contracting officer representative uh to assist with the government oversight on some contracts um on behalf of the army. And so since then I just stayed in school as a contracting officer and I've turned down a warrant. I didn't want to be a warranted uh KO contracting officer, and uh I was trying to make it in the private sector. Uh had a wife and children and uh working on my MBA thanks to the GI Bill again. Uh always stayed affiliated with the reserves, did tours, and in the 90s uh I worked for Fortune 50 and 100 companies, and they were having layoffs, downsize, right sizing. Uh it was just incredible. And then uh when 9-11 hit, uh uh Kellogg Brandon Root of Halliburton hired me as a uh logistics supervisor and operations supervisor in Kuwait. Um I was like the second party into Camp Arefjon in Kuwait City, helped build um the logistics uh support base there in Kuwait City and uh later on to uh Camp Buring, which used to be Udari Flats. I was an assistant camp manager. And um, there was some highly irregular, uh illegal and unethical uh things that Halliburton and uh Cal Cal O'Branar Root was doing.
SPEAKER_01:And uh yeah, there was a book. Uh also, Rick, if you're able to uh look at the camera when you talk to me. If you can't, that's totally fine. I just I just picked up on that and should have said something uh offstage on that. But now you are perfect. Um what my question is is what were some of the irregularities that you started to see uh starting starting at that point uh initially uh slow rolling projects and lying about the um the ability for them to uh deliver on uh the list of deliverables and uh missing timelines and milestones.
SPEAKER_02:And uh when Kellogg Brandon Root did do something, they gold plated it. They gold plated it. They would overinflate the cost and pass it on because this was a global war on terrorism, GWAT money, GWAT dollars, and they thought it was endless or something. They said, build a government, they won't, they're so stupid they won't even know the difference. Wow, and it uh it was disheartening. Uh they'd come into they went into Kuwait and bought up all the assets just like they did in the Balkans, and then they would overinflate the prices and turn the contracts for uh uh bashish or a facility payment, or internationally known as business payments. And uh I refused uh to lie to like uh I was briefing uh colonels, uh 06s, full colonels, and uh task order uh uh managers and stuff, and uh I refused to sign off on some stuff that uh um that uh Kellogg Brennan root uh it was government-owned, uh contractor operated equipment and stuff like that. Um they wanted me to tell the uh the 06s and stuff and above that it was mission capable and it was good equipment coming out of Europe and Saudi Arabia, and it was not. I did uh um I did a lot of actual hands-on uh uh inspections, and uh it was just a terrible ripoff. And Kellogg Brennan route through Halliburton, the international oil uh uh giant, had all kinds of uh contacts in uh Saudi Arabia and other places where they were buying second and third hand equipment and trying to pass it off, such as tractor trailers for the theater transportation mission that was upcoming just before uh in 04 when we jumped off into Iraq. And stuff was just uh it was just terrible, and uh overly inflated uh bids and prices. And so then they transferred me up to uh on the border in uh it was Camp Udari and that's Camp Buring and as an assistant camp manager. Uh I didn't feel good about lying to the army, which had been like uh second family to me, and uh not to mention the taxpayers. I just couldn't in good conscience. Uh there's enough money to be made. They were the 800-pound gorilla in the uh in the room because before that uh at uh Army Corps of Engineers as a contracting lady, uh they eventually fired her and ran her out. She got a settlement. Halliburton got her fired from her job uh for blowing the whistle on Dick Cheney's um sole source contract.
SPEAKER_01:Wow. And uh it's just and what would happen if you as you started to see this, was there just a culture of this is just the way things are, and you your job is to just to go along with it?
SPEAKER_02:Go along to get along or either get crushed, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, wow, huh? So you had had this experience and you'd seen this kind of uh malfeasance be accepted. And so tell me a little bit about what happened as you took on your next job in the Pentagon. Uh, what were or where we are in the timeline from what you from the fraud that you saw uh while seeing contracting overseas um to what you saw when you were in the Pentagon?
SPEAKER_02:Uh 2003 to 2004, I endured that in Kuwait with um Halliburton's Kellogg Renner route. And then uh I deployed then my then my reserve unit uh selected me and I deployed to Iraq in 2004-2005, and I was the uh uh log cap, logistics planner and core over the largest task order. I think it was a billion dollars, billion dollars a month in the largest uh uh footprint of the uh American forces. And uh so I had all that experience, and then I came back and um then in 2006 I deployed to um Kabul, Afghanistan. I was uh Corps again and doing logistics for the um uh the J4, the uh joint staff logistician to uh to um Lieutenant General Lackenberry. And um even the Army, some of the people in the above me wanted me to sign off on things that were questionable or I wouldn't do it, or or were absolute fabrications because they were careerists or wanting to get their ticket punched or didn't want to raise any flags about uh money being extorted or stolen or property and uh can you give me an example? There was a uh in um Afghanistan, they grow rocks. I was just kidding, but uh lumber, any type of lumber or pulp uh products over there go for a premium. There was a warehouse outside of Kabul where I was at, and it had like millions of dollars worth of lumber. And I think it was a two-star uh Afghani general that was like their head logistician. And he had stolen all the all the wood out of it and sold it on the black market, and they wanted me, uh the army, and uh wanted me to sign a document that I had uh verified all the property in a warehouse and it was still there or had been utilized for military purposes, like when we were building base camps for um the Afghan National Army or the Afghan National Police in support of those missions. And I refused to do it because I knew he had knowledge and he was black marketing it and probably take sending the money to Swiss Switzerland or somewhere. So I got in heat for that. So I came off orders and went back, and in 2006 I started in the Pentagon as a um a DOD contractor uh with another company on a five-year contract doing uh IT portfolio management. And um I loved it. And uh that's how I ended up with a eventually approximately eight and a half years in the Pentagon until I blew the whistle on um in the illegal order to extort to assist to extort funds out of a contractor, a DOD contractor. And uh so March of 2025, I was removed from service after eight and a half years in the Pentagon.
SPEAKER_01:And uh so tell me a little bit about what the conditions were like uh with the people that and and tell me tell me kind of how that story got started with this uh process to have you removed. Like what were the conditions in that job? What was the job that you were doing, and what were what was it like working there at first?
SPEAKER_02:Prior to accepting this job, uh I uh I was a uh logistics subject matter expert in a corps uh for uh U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa. And I was their liaison officer and point of contact up here in the Pentagon at uh special office of uh SEGDEF for policy. And I loved it. Um when I wasn't doing that working supporting the SES down there at uh SOCOM in Tampa, I would do read-aheads for usually uh senior executives, SES, people who are in the senior executive service. SES is equivalent to general officer, flag officer, or civilians. And most of these were appointees and never been in the military, never been around it. And I would do read-aheads for them on topics, upcoming topics and meetings, brief them.
SPEAKER_00:I loved it.
SPEAKER_02:I was there two years. I got an outstanding uh annual performance review, which is the highest you can get, and the uh in the uh civilian uh US government civilian uh workforce, and then my next one was uh fully successful. And I asked my boss if I could get promoted. I was a GS-14 at the time. He said he'd love to promote me, but he didn't have a GS-15 slot available. Yep. Applied on USA jobs, and down the hallway, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition Sustainment had a uh program management analyst, which is uh my OPM job series, is 0343 uh program management analyst, and it was a contracting officer representative job, and uh it was down the hallway, and I applied and uh I was direct hire due to my uh knowledge, skills, and abilities, my KSAs, because I'm already program management level three out of three according to the Defense Acquisition University. I'm level two out of three in contracting and level two out of three in life cycle logistics. And um so I loved it. I walked in, uh I uh uh met the uh ended up meeting the two ladies that I was going to uh reported to. And um it it was gonna be uh I hate the way this sounds, but it's the truth. It was gonna be the easiest or cushiest job I ever had. And I'd hope to work a few years and retire out as I'm just 15.
SPEAKER_01:And uh and it was easy because it was something you knew so well, it was something that you were already a subject matter expert in, correct?
SPEAKER_02:Yes, ma'am. And uh it sounds bad because you're never supposed to be lax or you're supposed to always you know be diligent and stuff, but I thought, wow, this is gonna be Kush. Um the lady I worked for was a fellow GS-15, and she uh she managed two uh two contracts, and uh they were both competitors, which I thought was odd, but I didn't say anything. And um I was there.
SPEAKER_01:What do you mean they were both competitors? What do you can't say?
SPEAKER_02:They're federally uh I'm trying not to mention their names, they're federally funded research and development centers, and they both bid on um say an SES or a general or an admiral has a um they need some research and development or they need into a topic. And they're uh they're think tanks, but they're uh formerly FFRDCs, which I'm certified in uh through DAE Defense Acquisition University, and uh because I love to learn, and um she but anyway, she was in charge of the two, and the other corps, he and I shared an office, and uh he had never been a corps before. They hired him because he was ex-military, and he asked me to help him train uh learn some stuff, and I told him yes. And the longer I was there, I asked what happened to my predecessors and his. He had only been there a few months, also. Apparently, there had been three uh three uh veterans, professionals that had been there for like two or three years and had the jobs down past. But for some reason, this lady ran them off and forced them to leave. The two the two gentlemen went back to the Navy, the original um branch of service, and the other lady went to the um back to the air force. And I thought that was odd, but people kept under the table feeding me uh intel or intelligence on you know, don't trust this lady, watch her. She gaslights people, she's insecure because um for a year, 30 years she was a clerk and she finally got a bachelor's, so they promoted her all the way up through the ranks quickly to be a GS-15. And I didn't think much about it. Uh they said, well, my three predecessors, the veterans, were white.
SPEAKER_01:And I thought, well, you know, and let's view one. I'm not gonna say your name because I think we were you're comfortable with not saying names, so I don't want to say names. And but I will say she she was she's an African American because I think that's an important part of the story. And the people that quit, they were both white.
SPEAKER_02:All three.
SPEAKER_01:All three, okay.
SPEAKER_02:White, they they yes. And later I spoke with them and they said she uh she gaslit them and uh trying to intimidate them and try to get them to do, even at that time, questionable contracting actions, borderline illegal.
SPEAKER_01:And well, that's just the gossip you're hearing at this point, right? At this point, you're just hearing the gossip. What is your impression of her and how is she reacting and and interacting with you at first?
SPEAKER_02:At first, uh uh very cordial. Um said she was impressed with my credentials, yada yada yada. Um, and it everything rocked right along, uh, except uh in uh military and civilian. We have in processing. Well, I had to out-process for my last unit, even though it was down the hallway.
SPEAKER_01:Sure.
SPEAKER_02:I left the office of Secretary of Defense for a policy doing logistics to in-process their into their headcount and and even get issued their laptop and things of that nature and government phone. She was slow about that, and I asked her about it. She says, Well, don't worry, I'm getting around to it. Or she kept blaming my old unit or my old um directorate that they're slow dragging their feet, releasing you, and this and that, even though I gave them two weeks' notice. So I called the uh the chief of staff over there, the cost, a friend of mine, and he said, That's not correct. He said, She's uh slow rolling it and and not doing it. So it went on for a while, and I told my wife um who is brilliant, she's an attorney. Uh, I'm lucky that uh to have her. And she said, Oh, keep your guard up, but she said, just relax. You know, you're in the government, uh, you're at the pinnacle as a GS-15. So I did, but I kept my guard up, and this woman kept trying to like uh gaslight me or saying that uh what I was doing wasn't up to up to par. And I said, Well, I said, uh, give me uh examples, templates, and formats that you won't use and what's your writing style that you may like. Because I've been on a lot of um uh uh GOFO, general officer and flag officer staffs, and I've been um staffers to senior executives in the past, and she did that and would still like berate me or get me on a teleconference with everybody and saying that my work was substandard and this and that. Wow, and then one and then one day, and I she still hadn't let me fully in process yet into that new um entity. And I asked her about it, and she said, Well, she blamed it on my old uh losing unit again. And then she called me in the conference room on approximately 18 May 2022, and she just she and I felt uncomfortable, it was just she and I in there with the door shut. And you know, everything there is a skiff, a secure compartmentalized information facility, so you can't bring in electronics, which I wouldn't want to. Well, I would like to have a recording, but I couldn't.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:So she told me that she wanted me to tell the uh Federally Funded Research Development Center that I was a contracting officer representative of providing government oversight of, that she was going to pull, wanted was that she was gonna pull 10 projects underneath their umbrella contract and award them to their competitor. And I said, uh I advised her, I said, ma'am, you can't do that. It's uh illegal, unethical. And I said, nothing else, the optics are bad.
SPEAKER_01:So can you explain to people that don't understand the contracting world how that's uh how that's unethical? Like how just to basically tell another company that you're going to pull parts of their contract and give them to somebody else? Like I I listen to that and go, well, wait a minute, how how is that wrong?
SPEAKER_02:Well, it's wrong because the money has already been assigned and awarded um and being executed by the other contractor. And if you're not if you're not the PCO, the procuring contracting officer, or the procurement executive officer uh who brought the monies to the table, you're not authorized or empowered to do that. Not even she was. Why did she want you to tell her tell that company that the sole purpose was she wanted the other, she wanted the one that she threatened was gonna have me threaten to lose the 10 projects and make her an offer of cash or do a cost overrun or do a petty cash outage or something to slip her um a bribe. She was trying to use me to extort funds out of her. She told me she was getting ready, she's having medical issues and told me she's getting ready to uh get her high three years as a GS-15 and retire. And I guess she thought she was going to do that to enlist me or entice me to assist. And uh, you know, I tried my utmost to talk her out of it, and she kept insisting, started gritting her teeth at me and leaning down. She was at the head of the table, and I was like on the side.
SPEAKER_01:I see. So just so that I understand, if this company had decided to take the bait and go, oh shoot, they're gonna take away some of what we need, then this company could have done a cost overrun, which means they could have billed the government more money and said, Oh, we needed more money than what we said. And and your allegation uh is that the only reason why somebody would want to do that is because perhaps they were getting a uh kickback or or some sort of a reward uh for doing that for that company. But do you have do you have evidence, or is that just your suspicion that that was why she was doing it?
SPEAKER_02:Well, after approximately 25 years in in the uh DOD, DOW USG contracting realm, and when she leaned down in my face, got my face and gritted her teeth at me, and I wasn't intimidated, uh God sent me a message, an electrical impulse to my feeble mind. He said, Rick, ask her, tell her that you do not understand the uh the work directives, the work orders, and that you need an email so that you'll understand exactly what she's requiring of you. So when I said that, I said, ma'am, yep, I don't understand your directive, your work orders. Uh please email it to me. And I said, uh, you know, if it's legal, uh, legal and ethical, um uh I'll implement it. Because I had a good rapport with the uh the Federal Funded Research Development Center's manager, um that their office was uh across the way in Pentagon City, the uh across the highway there where a lot of the uh they so-called Beltway bandits have their offices because they're close to the center of power at the Pentagon. And uh she gritted her teeth at me and and and growled, get out of here, go back to the office now, go to work. And I was like, Oh my god, this is not happening. You know, I've had it happen in Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and now it's happening here in you know, in Arlington, Virginia, in uh DC, the Pentagon. I was like, so then I went to the uh I I was just kind of numb.
SPEAKER_01:So you never got the email. You never got the email of what her request was.
SPEAKER_02:No, no, she saw that I saw through that she was directing me to assist her in extorting funds. And this was uh I never got she never in processed me. I never saw the actual funding line, but it was like a$417 million contract. So they could have taken 10 projects worth of monies and done that as a uh cost overrun on other projects, uh petty cash expenditure or something. And their competitors, I was told their contract was only like 120 million. So she had me, she wanted me to assist her and extort funds from the larger of the two.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:And uh it probably would have only been an accounting blip. Excuse me, it probably would have only been an accounting blip um, you know, the Pentagon.
SPEAKER_01:It wouldn't have drawn any, it wouldn't have drawn any um uh red flags because cost overruns are a normal cost of doing business, and so she knew this. And when you called her out on it and said, Okay, you want me to do this, you send me an email, and instead she barks at you and says, get out of my office. So now you're like, holy shit, like some she was trying to do something that is fraud. So now what do I do? And so what do you do next?
SPEAKER_02:Only thing I knew to do, having gone from from E5 to O5, from a buck sergeant to lieutenant colonel, is I went up through my chain of command, which I'd already met, and uh Miss Clothilda Taylor, the senior executive, that was above the two of us, and I reported to she was my senior raider, and I'd met her before, and I told her, and uh she did her utmost to dissuade me or thinking that I was like what was your relationship like with this SES before this happened? Uh cordial, formal. Um her husband uh has was a retired uh non-commissioned officer down in Huntsville, and uh so she got in the SES Corps uh by being a spouse, and um it had always been pretty formal. She told me that this was her second time back in OUSDANS that she had gone to Department of Homeland Security to get her GS-15 and then came back to OUSDANS um to be promoted to a senior executive service, and so that she was girlfriends with the woman that I work for. So we're girlfriends, I've known her for years, and I'm like my head started swimming. I was like, oh my god.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, so she tells you this when you go to to report this, she says that. Or okay, so you didn't and you didn't know that up until that point, you didn't know that they were they were friends or or for or whatever, you didn't know that they had a relationship, correct?
SPEAKER_02:No, ma'am. So then I was like, I said, Well, ma'am, I need you to investigate or at least document or yeah, document my concerns, right? Right, and uh because this couldn't keep going on, or she couldn't because I called the three uh the three white veterans that she ran off before, and they all three basically said the same thing. Which was that the uh the frontline manager was uh gaslighting, pressuring them to do illegal and unethical uh contracting actions.
SPEAKER_01:I see. So she'd been doing this to people for a long time and getting away with it, probably. And suddenly she finds someone who she's not gonna get away with it with, and you go and you report her to your boss's boss, basically, which is the SES. And the SES says, Well, we're buddies, we go way back, and you're like, Okay, so that's where we're at.
SPEAKER_02:I had I had to go out in the courtyard and and get some sun like a lizard in the Pentagon. I had to like I called my wife, and then uh I emailed uh both the manager and the senior executive and requested through the open door policy to go to the next SES in line uh with through the open door policy, right?
SPEAKER_01:They have a published open door policy, which a lot of you know, flag officers and general officers have the same thing. So you're like, okay, open door policy, I'm going to use it. This is my one and only time. This is the hill that I'm gonna have to die on, so I'm gonna use it. Got it.
SPEAKER_02:Not by choice, exactly. Uh you're too young to know it, but the older I get, and after surviving Iraq and Afghanistan, I just want peace. But I met with this gentleman, he met with me, he had his military attache in there, an army uh 06, full colonel. And uh we met in his office, and uh after like 45 minutes or whatever, uh he refused to investigate. Now he was a senior raider to both of these two people. And on the way out the door, you know, he said, Well, Rick, and he was a white man, a Caucasian man, and he said, Rick, they're minorities.
SPEAKER_01:And I'm like he really said that to you out loud in front of his attache.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, that is. He kind of leaned towards me, leaned towards me and whispered it, but because he had a conference room table in there in his office.
SPEAKER_01:But he thought by telling you that he was probably saying, My hands are tied. I'm sorry, my hands are tied, there's nothing I can do.
SPEAKER_02:That's afraid, and he succumbed to the pressure, and then later on, when I went to the I went to the senior executive in charge of OUSDANS. Uh the original manager that gave me the illegal contracting order, she has since retired. This middle SES, he's retired. The SES who were girlfriends with the manager, she they promoted her out of there. Just like in the military, we should say, foul up and move up.
SPEAKER_01:Now, when you say girlfriends, I just want to clarify. We was this a suspicion that that they were in a in a relationship, or was this an open secret, or were they best friends? I just want to make sure I understand what you mean.
SPEAKER_02:I took it as best friends, but people who had been there months and years before me said it was an open secret.
SPEAKER_01:Open secret that they were having a relationship. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:That's what people were telling me. Sure. And you know, workplace uh rumor mill, of course, the SES's husband was still in uh Huntsville working or whatever, and he she never went home, but that's none of my business.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. And that and then that, but but but understanding those dynamics, honestly, helps you understand, hey, this person's obviously not going to do anything about this because she has some sort of a vested interest in this other individual, and so nothing's gonna happen. And then to be told by another individual, I can't touch this because they're minorities. And this is what we're this is what we're talking about, guys. I'm just gonna go full screen just for a minute, Rick. But this is what we're talking about when I talk about the problems with people who have feel that the uh DEI and diversity and all these other things, they feel like they are no longer able to speak up and speak out about issues. And this is a perfect example, according to Rick and Rick's story. And this is exactly what I know. There's other people out there who have dealt with this same issue. And they talk about it behind closed doors, but they won't talk about it in person. And this hurts everyone, this hurts minorities, this hurts women, this hurts white men, this word hurts us all. So I just want to put that out there. All right, back to you. So go ahead.
SPEAKER_02:I just say thank you for that disclaimer because that's the gist of it is uh when I first enlisted in the army, it was uh we hate all of you, you're all green, and uh treat people with dignity and respect and then stay out of their personal life or businesses, but not now and the in the Pentagon is in 2006 when I first got there and GWAT was hot and heavy, and like two-thirds of it were uniform personnel or people who had been veterans, and now with the uh with the dynamics have they had changed and the DEI dynamics, it is just it's just totally and a lot of them are careerist. They should be working for health and human services or somebody else, they should not be working for DOD.
SPEAKER_01:Um and I think what you're you're driving at, and you're saying it in the most sensitive way you can, is that unfortunately sometimes the best people did not get hired, and other characteristics such as identity, such as race, such as gender, or something else came into the factors of who was going to get these positions. And and the thing is that this cripples people, this cripples white people, this cripples women, I mean, this cripples white men, this cripples everyone from being able to say what the real problem is. And for those of you who think this isn't a problem, you're crazy because I can show you story after story and case after case where this has happened. And it just blows my mind when people say this isn't a problem. It reminds me, and one of these days, I will do a show on this about how people say that the transgender issue in sports isn't a problem. Or it is a problem. Obviously, it was debated in the Supreme Court today. So this is another one of those issues that nobody wants to talk about, but it is a problem. And we're not going to solve it by not talking about it. But to your point, too, Rick, I've had enough conversations with you to know that you are colorblind, that you don't care what color somebody is or what gender they are. You care that they get the job done. And that was the sense that I got from you when we discussed this case was that was your frustration with this issue as well.
SPEAKER_02:Well, as far as gaslighting, I was this has been going on three years now, and I've got five lawsuits going, including the Whistleblower Protection Act and the Merit Systems Protection Board. And I've been called, I was told that I. I falsified my creds, you know, like uh my MBA, uh uh my MA in art acquisition, my MS in cybersecurity, my defense acquisition university uh certifications that took me years. Uh, you know, I don't even have the the printer paper or the type or plus the credentials are in the computer.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:And uh uh it's just crazy. It's uh my passion is still with DOD. My son is serving uh last I heard he was still stationed in South Korea uh South Korea. Uh uh my wife, uh my wife is African American. I've been called a racist, I've been called I didn't know your wife was African American.
SPEAKER_01:That's that's interesting. That's an interesting part of the story as well.
SPEAKER_02:Well, yeah, I never I never told because I try and compartmentalize and keep personal things.
SPEAKER_01:Sure.
SPEAKER_02:Unless I let somebody get to know me or or I want to let them in. Um yeah, she's African American, and uh, you know, we've been together 10 years, and um you know, I look at people the the content of their character and their heart. Uh now for a few months uh those two managers uh fooled me. And then uh of course the middle uh the middle manager, the white guy, a white Caucasian man, like you know, he caved. I suspected that non-veteran, no uh showing a little bias, uh non-veteran.
SPEAKER_01:Sure, but I think that you can't.
SPEAKER_02:We have been told in the military, if you believe in it, have courage and be bold. I apologize for talking over you. Go ahead.
SPEAKER_01:No, I I'm so sorry to talk over you as well. I I think that it was an interesting observation that you made about how the Pentagon was made up of veterans and people who had served when you first got there, and then it slowly became people that were outside the Pentagon and didn't have the military experience. And I think that that matters. I think that's something that we have to think about. We have to think about that in the Department of Veteran Affairs. We have to think about that for any military organization. It should be people who've been in the military. It doesn't always have to be everyone who's been in the military, but that expertise has to be there. And so tell me a little bit. We we stopped the story when you got basically told, hey, they're minorities, nothing we can do. What did you do next?
SPEAKER_02:Well, then I made them all angry or angrier. I requested to uh open door policy with uh senior executive in charge of the all of OUSDANS. It reported directly to the deputy second. And uh not gonna mention his name. He's retired too now. He's back. I think I think the office of special counsel and the Jags are stonewalling me, hoping I either die, quit, or run out of my savings. But they're letting everybody retire or promote it out. Like the first SES, she's been promoted out of there, from what I understand. I went to him, he didn't have time for literally an open door, but we corresponded via email, and I put all them on the email. And that really got everyone's ire up. It irked them because hey, if I I try and always tell the truth, and I'm I'm not afraid to bring it to the light of day. So I brought it before him, and he basically told them uh to transfer me and don't and not crush me, not ruin my career, and to cease and desist on all the whatever ongoings. He he wouldn't really delve down into it, even though I'd already filed a DOD IG complaint, EEOC complaints. Uh I broke an ankle on my last diploma to Iraq, and uh there's five stories and five uh uh escalators in the Pentagon. Well, I heard it nearly broke it again, according to the uh the Navy commander, retired commander, orthopedic surgeon. He uh did two MRIs on it, and they even said I falsified that. So they denied my workers' comp. So I had to get a workers' comp attorney.
SPEAKER_01:Right. And I want to say I've seen a lot of these legal filings, and I could see that there was definitely seeming to be a pattern of retaliation. Like the stuff that I saw that you were getting written up for, they were just like these really petty grievances that anyone can say, Oh, I missed a meeting, or I think one of them was uh the your tone. And it just reminded me of like all the couple times I've been written up in the Navy when no one has anything on me. They like they'll they'll just find something like you missed a meeting, you were 10 minutes late for this, because that's when they're in the like the dirt, they're trying to try trying to get some dirt on you. And so that's the sense I got as I was reading your filings was that this was now becoming a let's see what we can get on Rick. Was that is that kind of what happened in those in those write-ups that I saw?
SPEAKER_02:Steal on target, a one or spot on. However, I can make a positive.
SPEAKER_01:Well, I know because I I've been in that same position where I I had the person that that that they didn't really want to deal with. So it's like, well, let's find some dirt, let's find something.
SPEAKER_02:And you know, they're they're trying to provoke you into actually giving them something to work with. Got over the years, like you've said, the years and life experiences and having met different different people. Uh, those are takeaways that, especially, and I'm biased again, but especially in the military, because you have so many experiences with uh people and situations, right?
SPEAKER_01:And you work for so many good people that you know when you're working for a bad person, like you know, you know that this is just petty, stupid stuff because you're like, wait a minute, like I was this great person for these other visionary leaders who wanted results and wanted to see impact, and then suddenly, like, I can't do anything right according to you. And that's when you know that you're just in a in a toxic work environment, like you know that there's nothing you can do. So, so Rick, I have to say, as I read your story, I mean it definitely resonated with me. And and like I always tell my my audience, you know, I I fully do my best to vet these stories as as well as I can. I'm always open to the other side. And I believe you, Rick. I believe what happened to you, and I am sad that it took me to be the one to put your story out on a podcast. And I hope others will will pick this up. And I'm I'm glad militarycorruption.com was the first to really break your story, and they've done a terrific job of keeping up with you and getting uh a lot of detail uh into the story as well. So I think that's really important uh for people to see that. And I I will link to those stories in the in the show note description. But so let's go back to you go all, they say, Oh, well, let's just get rid of the problem. That's what they do. They're like, okay, we'll just move the problem somewhere else, or we'll move him away from the problem, and then then we can wipe our hands of it. We're not gonna fix the systemic problem or the issues with this person's leadership, because that's too hard. Uh, but what we will do is we'll we'll just remove the person that tried to blow the whistle on him on this person and we'll put them in another department. So that's what they did. And then so tell me then what happens.
SPEAKER_02:Well, that throws the root cause analysis out that you and I've always been trained to to get to the right core of the problem. Um the uh the SES, who was the the last one standing, um she said, Well, I'm gonna reassign you. And I said, Oh my god, because you know the GS 15 is uh it's like a pyramided um ladder, it's it's the highest uh general service um rank or pay grade there is, so there wasn't many options, but uh I'm in Office of Personnel Management, uh NH-0343 is my job series classification. It's program management analyst, and I'm already a program management level three in DAU, which is DOD equivalent to a program management professional in the private sector. So all of a sudden, there was this. I'd met this guy before, but she ended up transferring me over to the security department, which still fell under her at OUSD uh in acquisition and sustainment. She was the director of the defense business office. So all the ash and trash, the administrative departments fell underneath her. So instead of transferring me to uh I contacted my old boss back at um uh offices of uh Secretary of Defense for policy, and he said he didn't have a vacancy, and especially at the GS-15 level. He was the GS-15, retired Army 06 colonel. He and I got along really well, good guy, great American. And so she transferred me to the security department. And I said, I said, ma'am, I don't want to go to security. I'm not a security uh administrator, which is a uh 0080 under the OPM Office of Personnel Management. Never been trained in it. I've done some assistant uh intel work as assistant intel officer and this and that, but I said I don't, and I have no desire to start over with the credentials again through the Office of Defense and uh ODI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, through their core curriculum to learn courses to get certified because I like to get certified in whatever I'm trying to do. I try and be my utmost, and I make mistakes, don't get me wrong, but I never intentional or never they're on my own. I try and uh get uh uh educated, and uh she said, Well, I'm transferring you over there. So I said, Okay. I didn't argue with her, I was so happy because they still had not even in process me. And when they released me, I had not been in process. And there's a the Pentagon, the Washington Headquarters Service, their HR department, has an in-processing form and an out-processing form, just like most military or almost or any military unit I've ever been to.
SPEAKER_00:Sure.
SPEAKER_02:Active duty reserves, they've all got an in-processing form, out processing form. Nothing else to make sure that you've been read out of projects or programs, or to turn back in your government uh equipment, government furnished uh property or equipment. And uh so the first year rocked on, and uh annual performance review was uh satisfactory. They gave me a step increase, the manager I worked for. The other guy that worked for him, he told him uh, he told the other GS-15, the security director, I want I want Rick to work for me. And I'm like, I'd met him a few times, and he's younger than my daughter. He's like, no, I think maybe two one or two years older than my daughter. He's like 42, I guess. I've got a daughter who's 40, I can't believe it, but anyway, and I'm like it was odd to me, and um anyway, he transferred they transferred me over there on paper, and they changed uh I refused to reclassify to become an OPM uh 0080 security administrator. And so this guy, when we're in private and his office in the SCIF in the secure compartmentalized information facility, he had a little office away from the 10 or 12 contractors that worked out there, and he made some weird advances towards me. Um always trying to drive dress professionally. He said, made comments about my excuse me, about my uh suits and uh one one time about my cologne, and he touched my arm one time, my leg, and this and that. And I'm like, look, you know, I'm happily married, I've got children. He said, Well, he didn't have children, didn't want any. And I said, Well, that's fine.
SPEAKER_01:I said, look, and then uh uh so I rebuked his uh sexual advances because we've had uh you know, every six months in the military, you've had sharp training, uh sexual harassment and I don't remember sexual somebody else, maybe who's listening to but I know what you're talking about sexual harassment training.
SPEAKER_02:Yep, yeah. Um, I've got the acronym here somewhere, but anyway, so he got angry with me, and then I was still out on medical uh telework and hybrid because what they had me doing at the time was on um uh the the Nipper net, the non-secure uh protocol router versus the secret and above, which I'd worked on for decades, it and Jay Wicks. But um he started all of a sudden he started demanding that I come into the office, and I've got emails and this and that. And I said, Well, I haven't I'm still on medical hold pending a second surgery on this ankle, or until workers' comp clears me and this and that. And I said, I hadn't even been in process, and um I've got a handicapped parking pass for the Pentagon where I could park closer. Uh I've got some injuries and stuff from decades of service in Iraq and Afghanistan, and uh uh not as mobile as I once was, and uh so he denied me my parking pass. And I said, Well, you know, I've got mobility issues, and then so then he I started triggering and triggering my PTSD. So I said, Well, I'll send all the documentation in, and Washington Headquarters Services that services the HR and the Pentagon approved me to bring in my service dog, which she's approved and everything and trained, and he refused that, but yet I kept getting emails threatening me, I want you in here at least three days a week, and you can share my office. And I I was trying to distance myself from him, so then I had to file a complaint against him, and I I believe the SES knew that he had um predatory sexual predatory tendencies, and um so then March of 2025, um they called me and removed me from service after 43 years.
SPEAKER_01:Did they say why? What did they say it was?
SPEAKER_02:They trumped up like uh my attorneys are laughing. They're vague and ambiguous, six items. Like they tried to like tone and uh things of that nature.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, just your your tone, missing meanings, just the things that I saw you written, the things that you were being written up for, which could easily be explained. They could easily have a counter-argument. There wasn't anything that I saw in any of that that I was like, oh wow. It was more like I you can kind of tell. I don't know. There's just something you can tell about the way someone's being written up. When you can tell when someone has an agenda or when that there's right.
SPEAKER_02:Instead of letting me escape and go on to my career or whatever and let them do whatever they're going to do, it's blatant retaliation.
SPEAKER_01:What's really sad about it, Rick, is that they could have transferred you out of there, and then when the alleged harassment happened, then they should have just dealt with that. And if they had dealt with that, then you still would have probably quietly retired, and the problem still would have existed, but we wouldn't be where we are today, where they just basically denied, denied, denied, didn't want to handle it, didn't want to handle it, didn't want to handle it. And so now, where does everything stand today?
SPEAKER_02:Well, you've hit the crux of the of the whole thing. Just because you deny or run away from the issue doesn't make it go away. Right. Um, the Marit Systems Protection Board is pending right now. My whistleblower protection act, which has been uh updated and modified in 2012. Um, those are still pending. Uh, unfortunately, due to the past, it was pushed to the right on the calendar. Uh, for the people who don't get our jargon, our military jargon, it was pushed to the right. Uh the decision due to the uh the government shutdown. So the judges weren't working. Sure. I've got an EEO C suit with another firm, workers' comp, um, and an ADA, American Disabilities Act. I was denied my parking pass. I was denied to bring on my service dog. Uh, when there's people who do that, and um it's just crazy. Like you said, it's unnecessary grief.
SPEAKER_01:Well, and they may think part of it.
SPEAKER_02:Duress here at home with uh my wife and I, and and uh uh and thank God I had some uh investments, but I've had to go through them, my firms. Uh they said, Oh, you're gonna recover. Uh yeah, but in the interim, I have got to live. Yeah, and one of my attorneys even witnessed we tried to go through mediation with the office of special counsel, the deal D IGs, and this 30-something-year-old young lady, a JAG, we're gonna blackball you from the industry. Or no, we're she said, but that was the gist of it. But she said, You're never gonna work in the industry again. So they consider aerospace and defense like an industry. I don't, it's a passion to me, an industry, and then you should have taken your law degree and gone to work for HUD or Health and Human Services or somebody else. But my afterwards, my attorney called me and she was aghast. She said, I can't believe on an open forum that that attorney said that. I said, ma'am, I said, You're right. I said, That's the type of vicious uh DEI. Once they uh there's they're absolutely correct and they're cutthroat.
SPEAKER_01:Right. I've had a talk with uh Bill Brown about this too. It's like they think they have sometimes people when they're in this place it with with the whole DEI issues, they think they have the moral high ground. So there isn't any room to have any discussion about the issue. And so what they do though, it's it appears based on what you're telling me on the story, is that they just dug a bigger hole than they had to have. Really, what should have happened is they should have just addressed your original concern with the fraud. Now, the fraud could have been a he said she said. I get it. Like she's gonna deny that she ever said that to you, and it's gonna turn into a big he said she said. So them moving you, I can see why they did that. Okay. But then when they moved you and this person harassed you, well, then what they should have done is they should have investigated the harassment, the the the the allegation. Instead, it just sounds like all they did was how much dirt can we pull on Rick and what excuse what reasons can we continue to have to try to fire him, knowing, but knowing that you were going to do exactly what you're doing now, which is you were gonna speak up about it, you were going to use your legal rights, and you were going to, even if, even if you don't win, the fact that that they how much time have they spent on this? How much time have you spent on this? How much money has been spent on both sides on this? That's just that's the sad part about all of this. All because somebody was getting away with something for probably a very long time, and they weren't going to do anything to be the ones to fix it.
SPEAKER_02:And where I'm from, I'm too stubborn or too dumb to quit. Uh it's a matter of honor. And uh uh having been a certified DOD Department of War core contracting officer representative for over 20 plus years, and with everything that's coming to light with the internet, and thank God for people like you putting out the energy and effort, we see there's a lack of government oversight, right? Especially in contracting. Because one of the uh one of the old things that we have in the Pentagon, I mean some old heads like me, which we used to speak in open forum, and now we have to go out and we had to go out in the uh in the courtyard or quadrant to make sure nobody overheard or offended is uh uh nothing comes out of uh the government except requirements. Everything is done by contract. And so yet, and that's why some people, especially if they're at the very top of the pyramid, they're not afraid to take a risk of contracting extortion or fraud or fraud, waste, and abuse. Because if nothing else, that's like Kellogg Brown and Root of Halliburton, uh, after the GWAT, after the uh the reconciliation and accounting, excuse me, OMB and GAO made them, they paid back like I think 250 plus million dollars of accidental overcharges to the government, to DOD. Come on. Accidental overcharges. They knew what they're doing, and plus they've already made money on that money before they had to pay it back.
SPEAKER_01:Right. So it's not even a consequence to have to pay back the money. They can just admit that they made some overcharges or there was some mistake in the accounting, and then everyone's gonna move on. And I think that's that's the the crust of this issue, Rick, is that if people think they can just get away with doing these kind of things, they're just gonna keep on doing them. And that has to stop. And that's where us little podcasters, that's where we really can be the light to expose these issues and say, no, this is wrong. We're not going to stand for this. This is not what our government should be standing for. This is not the way we treat people. So the thing that does make me feel better is that your case is still uh pending an a disposition. And so all I can say is that I really do hope that through some of these processes you do get some sort of restoration or justice, or just like in my last show when the secretary of the army uh admitted that they did not take care of this this poor woman's son, and they owned that they did it and they paid out the claim, which is very rare in the army claims process. So I I really hope that's the same outcome that you have from this case. And is there anything else as we're kind of winding down the call that you want to add or any parts of the story that that we left out?
SPEAKER_02:Well, I've got some notes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, take a look at your notes. I want to make sure that we cover down on everything you want to say.
SPEAKER_02:Well, I'm I'm thankful. Uh sincerely thankful for you and uh persons of of your character who are doing this to bring things to the light of day. Um, just hopefully that this won't happen or will prevent or curb some of this from happening in the future. Um I just uh I mean, my god, people violate boldly violate federal, much less their agency laws. I mean, it's like plus the laws of human nature. I mean, um hopefully you guys can make a positive change in the world. I'm sorry, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, I was just gonna say, Rick, just basic kindness and and goodwill towards others. I mean, that's really what we what we strive to do and how we strive to treat one another. And when we don't treat one another like that, it it's really sad. And I I think that's why I've been doing a lot of posts too about lawfare and and like we gotta stop. We gotta stop with the law fair, we gotta stop with the lawsuits, and we gotta start learning how to talk to one another, and we gotta start listening when somebody is saying, hey, this person is doing something that's wrong, and this person needs to stop, and you need to be. I mean, what would have happened if that SES had just said, All right, I got it, I'll take care of it. That's unacceptable. We wouldn't be here, you'd still have a job. I mean, that's just it's just that's that's what needs to happen as we move forward. Um, well, definitely please keep us posted on this. I will, like I said, link to the full story on military.com. Sorry, my camera once again uh seems like around the top of the hour it's it's always going out, but we're we're ending the call anyway. So we're at a good spot. But I'll I'll go ahead and plug in my other camera. But um with that, I just want to thank you so much uh for taking the time to come on the Stories of Service podcast, for sharing your story with our audience, uh, because I really do believe that we become better and we become more of a society that's not afraid to tackle hard issues when we have these conversations. So thank you again.
SPEAKER_02:Well, thank you for your ongoing service, even though you're retired. You're truly doing uh a national and an international service by bringing uh truth to the light of day. And hopefully it'll have a positive impact in the future.
SPEAKER_01:I hope so. I hope so. Like I said, we're gonna keep you, we're gonna keep the audience posted on what becomes of this. And uh, I just I just thank you so much for joining the podcast. And with that, guys, I'll just do my closing here. Oh, it looks like I did get a get my other camera hooked in so I can kind of face you and do my closeout. So, Rick, I'll meet you backstage while I go full screen and say goodbye to the audience. Goodbye. And with that, guys, thank you so much for joining the Stories of Service podcast. Uh, I will be back at it this Thursday with a gentleman who is working on the intersection of mental health issues and responsible gun ownership. So, should be a really good episode. I am definitely somebody who is a big believer in supporting the right to bear arms. So I really can't wait to talk to him more about his views and his issues and ways that we can all be safe and still own firearms. So, with that, as I always do, thank you all for joining the Stories of Service podcast. Please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, and have a good rest of your evening. Bye bye now.