The White House fired the Trump-appointed Equal Opportunity Commission (EEOC) chief executive on Friday night after her refusal to retire.
In a firm letter Friday morning to President Biden, Sharon Gustafson said she rejected the White House’s request for her resignation “with respect” and pointed out that she had only served half of her four-year term.
“I intend to honor that commitment,” she wrote in a letter issued by the Ethics and Public Policy Center. “I have given this countless advice to countless customers with confidence over the past 25 years: keep your head up, do your best and do not resign under pressure. I stand in solidarity with them, I will follow the advice,” she said. added. .
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Gustafson was notified less than three hours later by the deputy director of the presidential staff office of the White House, Gautam Raghavan, in an email that her service would end on Friday at 17:00.
Gustafson, the first woman to serve as a member of the EEOC’s main board, noted that her removal was extremely irregular and that a general board had never been removed before because she had been ‘appointed by the wrong political party’.
In her letter to Biden, she accuses the administration of suppressing her work on religious discrimination, by removing press releases, reports and podcasts from the EEOC website after its inauguration.
“I can only assume that my resignation will be followed by similar repression of our work that promotes religious freedom,” Gustafson wrote.
Republicans judge the move as a political attack and pointed out that Biden’s campaign had promised to end the partisan fighting in Washington.
“This is a pattern. President Biden is calling for an end to ‘partisan warfare’, only to turn around and demand that officials confirmed by the Senate resign so that he can make room for his leftist friends,” he said. the Republican Republic of North Carolina, Virginia Foxx. said in a statement.
“President Biden must take note of General Councilor Gustafson, who adhered to her commitment and refused to hold back under biased pressure. This unprecedented dismissal of a respected public official took place a few hours after she was asked to to resign is unfounded and should be revoked immediately. ” Foxx said.
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Gustafson investigated comments she made about the LBGTQ community after her appointment in 2018. She was confirmed by the Senate in August 2019.
The EEOC did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment.