The Washington Blade reports today that Scott Bloch, an anti-gay Bush administration official, has filed a federal racketeering lawsuit naming the Human Rights Campaign and two gay Obama administration officials, John Berry and Elaine Kaplan, among over a dozen other defendants. Bloch, who filed the lawsuit jointly with his wife, is seeking $102 million in compensatory damages and $100 million in punitive damages.
Berry is the director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and Kaplan, who preceded Bloch as the director of the Office of Special Counsel during the Clinton administration, is now OPM’s general counsel.
The lawsuit charges these defendants – others of which include former Bush administration operative Karl Rove, former GOP Congressman Tom Davis of Virginia and the Executive Office of the President – with conspiring to have Bloch removed from his position as head of the U.S. Office of Special Counsel through an unwarranted criminal investigation.
In April of 2010, Bloch – who served as director of the Office of Special Counsel from 2004 to 2008 – pleaded guilty to a charge of contempt of Congress after a lengthy FBI investigation revealed evidence suggesting that Bloch tried to fire office employees who challenged his opinions. When a raid on Bloch’s home exposed a possible attempt to hide such activity through the professional removal of files from his government computer, Bloch was sentenced to one month in jail. However, the federal judge who delivered the decision thereafter stayed the sentence and allowed Bloch to file an appeal.
During Bloch’s service with the Office of Special Counsel, Kaplan was among those who criticized his reversal of LGBT-supportive policies established during her directorship. Now, Bloch is arguing that the Bush White House threatened to have him removed from his position if he did not keep the LGBT-supportive policies in tact.
At this time, the exact allegations against Kaplan, Berry and HRC are undetermined. Stay tuned for updates in this case as details of the lawsuit become available.
