Pentagon denies stonewalling Biden transition team
The Department of Defense said on Friday that a directive concerning transition team meetings, which had been reported as a Pentagon order to halt all cooperation, was a request for a temporary delay.
“I remain committed to a full and transparent transition — this is what our nation expects and the DoD will deliver,” acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller said in a statement intended to squash the claims.
The Axios report alleged that Miller ordered officials across the Pentagon to cancel scheduled transition team meetings. A senior DOD official told the Washington Examiner that no such order was issued.
Rather, a delay of Friday’s meetings until after the holidays was requested to manage competing priorities.
“At no time has the Department canceled or declined any interview,” Miller's statement read.
The statement indicated that since Nov. 23, the DOD has conducted 139 interviews with 265 officials, responded to 161 requests for information, provided 4,400 pages of nonpublic information, and provided 900 pages of classified information to the Biden-Harris transition team.
“DoD continues to support the presidential transition aligned with the President Transition Act, White House and Biden-Harris Transition Team Memorandum of Understanding, and DoD policy," Miller's statement continued.
The official explained that the DOD is currently working to provide Congress with the information necessary to pass a continuing resolution and to keep the government open. Operation Warp Speed, a joint effort to manage vaccine production and distribution, is also in full swing, and the DOD is managing the fallout related to a major cybersecurity breach across a number of government agencies.
The official said that both the DOD and the transition team previously agreed to a two-week break in meetings, adding that unlike the 2016 transition, which involved largely junior officials, this year’s meetings are with senior DOD personnel. Meetings scheduled for 30 minutes have often run to an hour or longer.
“We’re actually ahead of where they were,” the official said.
The Washington Examiner has reached out to Axios for comment.
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