Emily Murphy | |
---|---|
Administrator of General Services | |
Assumed office December 12, 2017 | |
President | Donald Trump |
Deputy | Allison Brigati |
Preceded by | Timothy Horne (Acting) |
Personal details | |
Born | Emily Webster Murphy 1973 (age 50–51) St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. |
Political party | Republican |
Education | Smith College (BA) University of Virginia (JD) |
Emily Webster Murphy (born 1973) is an American attorney and government official who is the Administrator of the General Services Administration (GSA). GSA oversees the federal civilian workforce, federal government properties, and federal contracts.[1] She is best known for refusing to allow President-elect Biden's transition team to access federal agencies and transition funds.
President Donald Trump appointed Murphy GSA administrator in 2017.[1][2] During her tenure, two issues that were personally important to Trump became sources of controversy for Murphy and the GSA: the hotel that Trump operates under a federal lease (in Washington, D.C.'s Old Post Office) and plans for the relocation and consolidation of the FBI's headquarters (in his first year in office, Trump personally intervened to halt the long-planned movement out of the J. Edgar Hoover Building).[2] In March 2018, an Inspector General's report found that Murphy had a policy of permitting alcohol consumption on agency property.[3][4] After Murphy testified before Congress about an aborted change in FBI headquarters, an August 2018 Inspector General's report concluded that her testimony was "incomplete" and "misleading".[5][6]
When Joe Biden was generally acknowledged on November 7, 2020 to have won the 2020 United States presidential election, Murphy refused to sign a letter allowing Biden's transition team to access federal agencies and transition funds; this came as Trump refused to acknowledge Biden's victory.[2] By refusing to allow the Biden administration transition to proceed, she prevented the incoming administration from obtaining office space, performing background checks on prospective Cabinet nominees, accessing COVID-19 vaccine information, and accessing classified information that might be needed to respond to emergencies the Biden administration confronts.[7] The Trump administration's attempt to undermine the election result, including its refusal to cooperate in the transition, has been described as an attempted coup.[8]
Murphy was born in 1973 and raised in St. Louis, Missouri.[9] She has a brother and a sister.[9] Her father James J. ("Jim") Murphy Jr. was chairman of Murphy Company Mechanical Contractors and Engineers, and her mother, Mimi Murphy (née Webster), was an attorney.[10][11] Murphy attended Villa Duchesne and Oak Hill School, from which she graduated in 1991. She received a Bachelor of Arts from Smith College in 1995 and a Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2001.[12][13][9]
After graduating from Smith, Murphy moved to Washington, D.C., beginning her career at the Republican National Committee (RNC). She worked for the RNC as Assistant to the Director of Administration from October 1995 to January 1997. She then worked as a staff member for Jim Talent while he served as Chair of the House Committee on Small Business from January 1997 to July 1998, before leaving to pursue a law degree.[14]
Murphy previously served as counsel at the United States House Committee on Armed Services, where she specialized in acquisition policy and reform. She has also held roles at the Small Business Administration and at GSA, where she served as the agency's Chief Acquisition Officer.[15] Murphy served under three chairmen of the United States House Committee on Small Business. Her private sector experience includes five years in executive positions at a technology startup company engaged in federal contracting and three years as a government contracts attorney with two D.C. law firms.[16][17]
After President Trump took office in January 2017, Murphy was appointed to the position of senior advisor to acting General Services Administration administrator Timothy Horne.[18][12] On September 2, 2017, Trump nominated Murphy to the post of GSA administrator. The Senate confirmed Murphy's appointment by unanimous consent on December 5, 2017.[18]
During her tenure, two issues that were personally important to Trump became sources of controversy for Murphy and the GSA: the hotel that Trump operates under a federal lease (in Washington, D.C.'s Old Post Office) and plans for the relocation and consolidation of the FBI headquarters.[2]
The FBI had long scheduled a move out of its D.C. headquarters, the J. Edgar Hoover Building, as the aging building was falling apart and not secure.[2] The bureau's headquarters were planned to move to a suburban location.[2] The project had been in the works for more than a decade, but in 2017 Trump personally intervened to kill the plan.[2] Democrats said that Trump canceled the move to prevent the Hoover Building site from being redeveloped into a hotel that could compete with Trump's hotel across the street; the Trump White House denied that Trump's business played into the decision.[2][19] House Democrats investigated the episode.[19]
In April 2018, Murphy told a congressional oversight hearing that the decision to stop the FBI from moving its headquarters came solely from the FBI, without Trump's involvement.[19] But three months later, the GSA inspector general (IG) released a report finding that Murphy's statement to Congress was "incomplete and may have left the misleading impression that she had no discussions with White House officials in the decision-making."[19][20] According to the report, Murphy and other GSA officials had multiple meetings with Trump about the FBI headquarters, specifically a two-day meeting in January 2018 between Murphy, Trump, White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, and budget director Mick Mulvaney.[21] The IG report also found that GSA officials misrepresented the costs of an alternative plan to build a new FBI headquarters in downtown D.C., portraying the replacement plan as cheaper than the original plan when it would actually be more expensive.[21] In October 2018, House Democrats disclosed internal GSA emails showing that GSA discussed "the President's instructions", "direction from WH" and "what was decided in the meeting with POTUS" in January 2018.[19]
In August 2019, a report by the GSA inspector general, examining an episode in 2017, was released under a Freedom of Information Act request. The report examined an episode in which a GSA associate administrator (who later left the government) admitted to having sex with a White House staffer on the GSA headquarters rooftop after drinking alcohol in a suite area. Murphy reportedly told investigators in February 2018 "that she 'often permits' her immediate staffers to drink alcohol in the office after business hours on Fridays but said she was 'very careful about such approvals.'"[4]
The GSA administrator officially determines when an incoming presidential administration can begin to access federal agencies and transition funds. After November 7, 2020, when Joe Biden became generally acknowledged as president-elect following the 2020 election, Murphy refused to sign a letter allowing Biden's transition team to begin work to facilitate an orderly transition of power.[7][2]
Before the 2020 election, Murphy had reportedly spoken with David Barram, who was President George W. Bush's GSA administrator during the 2000 election, about the appropriate steps to take during a possible transition of power.[15] On November 10, four former Secretaries of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, Michael Chertoff, Janet Napolitano, and Jeh Johnson, called upon Murphy to initiate the transition, writing in a joint statement: "Our country is in the middle of twin crises: a global pandemic and a severe economic downturn. The pandemic will make any transition more complicated. At this period of heightened risk for our nation, we do not have a single day to spare to begin the transition. For the good of the nation, we must start now."[22][23]
On November 18, CNN reporters Kristin Holmes and Jeremy Herb published a profile of Murphy that included laudatory statements from her colleagues, who described her as a professional who "demonstrated a high degree of integrity" and an "ethical and moral person". According to the sources, Murphy was neither a "Trump person" nor a "partisan hack".[15] The piece described Murphy as "struggling with the weight of the presidential election being dropped on her shoulders, feeling like she’s been put in a no-win situation".
On November 19, the Chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform formally requested that Murphy brief Congress "on [her] ongoing refusal to grant the Biden-Harris Transition Team access to critical services and facilities".[24][25] The next day, House Democrats sent Murphy a letter reading, "Your actions in blocking transition activities required under the law are having grave effects, including undermining the orderly transfer of power, impairing the incoming Administration's ability to respond to the coronavirus pandemic, hampering its ability to address our nation's dire economic crisis, and endangering our national security." The letter set a response deadline of November 23, 2020.[26]
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