Biden fires railroad inspector general over toxic work environment allegations
President Biden on Friday fired a longtime official with the US Railroad Retirement Board after a probe determined he created a toxic work environment at the federal agency.
Similar allegations against at least two White House officials, however, appear to have gone uninvestigated and they remain employed.
Biden, 81, notified House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) of his decision to fire US Railroad Retirement Board Inspector General Martin Dickman for cause, according to multiple reports.
An investigation into allegations Dickman had been fostering a hostile work environment had been launched by the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency in January 2023.
The probe concluded that Dickman, who had been with the RRB since 1994, engaged in abusive treatment of employees, used inappropriate language – including slurs – and belittled staffers, according to the Hill.
Dickman is currently on administrative leave and will be officially terminated on April 28, according to the outlet.
Nearly a dozen current and former colleagues of first lady Jill Biden’s top aide Anthony Bernal have told The Post that the White House official has bullied and verbally sexually harassed colleagues over more than a decade.
Unlike Dickman, Bernal remains employed, and the president’s chief of staff Jeff Zients has dismissed the allegations against Bernal without investigating them.
“The president and first lady have full confidence in Anthony’s character, as do I. His many fans at the White House know him to be both gracious and tough, holding himself up to the highest standards, with a heart dedicated to public service,” Zients told The Post earlier this month. “It is disappointing that he is the target of unfounded attacks from unnamed sources.”
Bernal denied the claims in The Post’s story: “These unfounded attacks are not true.”
Allegations of fostering a “toxic” work environment have also been leveled against Biden’s “drug czar,” Dr. Rahul Gupta.
Several current and former White House Office of National Drug Control Policy staffers told Politico last month that Gupta, the office’s director, has pressured aides to raise his public profile at the expense of fighting the US opioid epidemic, and that the former practicing physician fumes when his travel arrangements are not to his liking.
In one instance, the Biden administration official allegedly canceled a trip months in the making because he refused to fly on Southwest Airlines. In another bizarre episode, Gupta allegedly demanded that staffers set him up with a different hotel room after he measured the square-footage of the room already booked for him and determined it was too small.
Gupta was also criticized by a former staffer for not supporting, and rarely listening to, aides recovering from substance use disorders that work in his White House office.
Biden told political appointees on his first day in the White House that he would fire them “on the spot” if “I hear you treat another colleague with disrespect, talk down to someone.”
“No ifs, ands or buts,” he added.
The White House did not respond to The Post’s request for comment.
