The research I found claimed it was William Lynn III but the guy looks like this pic.twitter.com/6mymxO1ruF
— brandon saunders (@bmsman) January 11, 2021
William Lynn III was once so in-demand by the Obama administration, that he garnered an ethics waiver to become Obama’s Deputy Secretary of Defense.
The request was made in the opening days of President Obama’s administration in 2009.
In November 2009, just days after winning the election, then President-Elect Obama pledged to bar lobbyists from his administration who had worked as lobbyists at any point in the previous two years.
Obama chose to grant a waiver to Lynn just three days after being inaugurated however.
“I am disappointed in President Obama’s decision to waive the ‘revolving door’ provisions of the executive order for Mr. Bill Lynn, his nominee to serve as deputy secretary of defense,” the late Senator John McCain (R-AZ) said at the time. “While I applaud the president’s action to implement new, more stringent ethical rules, I had hoped he would not find it necessary to waive them so soon.” [politico]
Lynn did have lawmakers championing his cause on Capitol Hill however. The waiver “removes an obstacle” to the nomination, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) said at the time, adding that he looks “forward to prompt consideration by the Senate.”
Lynn at the time had been a lobbyist with Raytheon, the U.S.-based global defense contractor.
Raytheon, had (and still does have) billions of dollars in Pentagon contracts for weapons programs like the Army’s Patriot Missile system and the Navy’s Tomahawk missile. In 2009 it was also developing a global position satellite communication system for the Air Force.
Lynn oversaw Raytheon lobbyists during his tenure there and did some lobbying of Congress himself. At DoD under Obama he led the Pentagon’s cyber security efforts.
Today Lynn heads Leonardo DRS, the U.S. subsidiary of Leonardo SpA, the billion-dollar Italian defense contractor. Leonardo SpA is currently at the center of accusations that intelligence operatives working in Italy conspired to manipulate vote counts in the Nov. 3 U.S. election.
That operation was allegedly carried out in several locations in Italy using, among other infrastructure, satellites owned and operated by Leonardo.
Lynn served in the President Clinton Administration as Under Secretary of Defense, Comptroller, from 1997 to 2001. He would join Raytheon in 2002. He worked in the private sector until President Obama assumed office and then once again joined the Pentagon.
Lynn has been associated with the Center for American Progress, a progressive think tank. He is also on the board of directors of the Atlantic Council, an organization of foreign policy professionals that advocates for globalist policies.