Former O.C. Executive Quits Federal Post

General Services Administrator Roger W. Johnson, the highest-ranking Republican appointed to the Clinton administration, ended months of frustration with the cutthroat politics of Washington by disclosing Wednesday that he has resigned, effective March 1.

Johnson, a former Orange County corporate executive who broke ranks with fellow Republicans when he endorsed Bill Clinton during the 1992 presidential campaign, also revealed that he has formally joined the Democratic Party.

In a resignation letter to President Clinton dated Jan. 17, Johnson stated that after leading a dramatic downsizing of the agency that manages everything from the government’s buildings to its car fleet and computers, his contribution had “reached a point of diminishing returns.”

“I have concluded that I can be of more help to you and your reelection, as well as to our government, on the ‘outside,’ where I can use the exposure and insight I have gained to provide . . . a more accurate picture of the very real accomplishments of your administration, but also identify the management problems that remain to be solved,” Johnson wrote.

In the letter, Johnson did not disguise his distaste for Washington’s political culture, where he was viewed by Democrats as an outsider and by Republicans as a traitor. During most of his tenure, he also was under review by his agency’s inspector general’s office for allegedly using government funds for personal business, a probe that continues even now.

“I believe the country has no idea of just how intolerant and then vitriolic and vengeful the status-quo infrastructure of Washington has become when faced with change or even a different opinion,” Johnson claimed in the letter he sent to the White House.

Johnson also accused the GOP’s “extreme right” of using the country’s dissatisfaction with inefficient government to attack the federal budget and “impose their own ideologies.”

The White House did not comment on Johnson’s resignation, deferring to Johnson, who has scheduled a news conference this morning to discuss it.

In an interview Wednesday, the 61-year-old former chief executive of Irvine’s Western Digital Corp. said he has no other job lined up but expects to work with the moderate Democratic Leadership Council and support Clinton’s reelection campaign.

“This hasn’t been an easy three years,” Johnson said.

“I have to say [we] are much more comfortable today than we were two years ago,” he added, referring to himself and his wife, Janice. “It’s not a ‘we’re mad and going home’ thing at all. It’s time to move on.”

But in many ways, Johnson’s departure is not surprising.

Almost since he brought his Republican businessman’s perspective to an agency that symbolized costly and wasteful government bureaucracy, Johnson was made to feel his contribution was neither appreciated nor wanted by entrenched bureaucrats and politicians on Capitol Hill.

Johnson soon came to second-guess his decision to help carry out Clinton’s 1992 campaign promise to “reinvent government.”

Stumbling through rough-and-tumble politics early on, Johnson found himself being audited by the inspector general’s office for allegedly using government telephones, travel funds and employees for personal business. Unfamiliar with government rules after years in corporate America, Johnson asked for a formal review to “clear the air” and reimbursed the government $1,062. But the findings prompted another round of investigations that remain unresolved.

“I don’t know where they’re at. It has no bearing” on his resignation, Johnson said Wednesday.

While maintaining that he is not as disheartened now as he was several months ago, Johnson’s resignation letter reflects the toll the personal attacks have taken on him and his wife.

“We have watched, helplessly, as you and the first lady, and scores of others, have been continuously and ruthlessly personally attacked,” Johnson told Clinton, whose wife has been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury as part of the Whitewater probe.

“As you know, I also experienced some of the same, and although our situation pales in comparison to yours, it does underscore the fact that if we are to attract qualified people to federal service, we must make the Washington political culture much more understanding, tolerant and receptive of different backgrounds, not only in attitudes but also in specific rules and regulations,” Johnson’s letter noted.

Johnson took credit for cutting 4,000 positions--20% of the total GSA work force when he arrived in 1993--without layoffs and reducing the agency’s spending.

But even those advances did not come without first battling White House budget officers, who preferred to cut spending by formula rather than through Johnson’s methods, which he believed could save more money in the long run.

During the interview, Johnson acknowledged that further progress requires a drastic change in the bureaucratic psyche that would allow bringing in professional managers and restructuring the budget process--a quixotic dream at this point, he believes, given Washington’s preoccupation with government shutdowns and presidential politics.

Being head of the GSA did not give Johnson the “visibility” needed to force necessary changes, he said, and his leaving would have the effect of “pulling out a needle from a self-sealing piece of rubber.”

Johnson also conceded a newfound fact of life: “Business people have done a disservice by saying [government] has to be run like a business, because it isn’t a business. You don’t have to be a businessperson to be a professional manager, to operate effectively.”

Regarding his political conversion, Johnson said the GOP’s move to the conservative right has left him with “no platform in the Republican Party. No one is going to listen to a moderate, especially a moderate who supported Bill Clinton.” While he does not agree with the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, he said, it at least has room for moderates.

Johnson’s wife became a Democrat more than a year ago, he said.

Through the Democratic Leadership Council, the moderate group that nurtured Clinton’s presidential aspirations, Johnson said, he hopes to find a base for his government and policy management ideas.

He also emphasized that his relationship with Clinton and Vice President Al Gore remains strong. In his letter to the president, Johnson noted, “I am more pleased today that I supported you than I was four years ago.”

When he and seven other Orange County Republicans gathered in 1992 to announce their support for Clinton, Johnson not only split with his party but also with the moneyed and powerful Lincoln Club of Orange County.

On Wednesday, Buck Johns, a Newport Beach businessman and Lincoln Club board member, laughed upon learning that Johnson had changed his party registration.

“The true colors of old Roger are very apparent now,” Johns said.

It was the kind of reaction Johnson anticipated.

“I don’t really care about that anyway,” he said. “I think what I’m doing here is really joining the moderate part of the Democratic Party, which, to me, lays right on top of what Republicanism used to stand for.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Profile: Roger W. Johnson

Age: 62

Hometown: Hartford, Conn.

Residence: Laguna Beach and Washington

Marital status: Married, 39 years

Education: Master’s degree in business administration and industrial management, University of Massachusetts, 1963

O.C. incarnation: CEO of Western Digital Corp.

Resigning as: Head of General Services Administration, with 20,000 employees and a $60-billion budget

Confirmed as GSA head: July 1, 1993

Political profile: Was highest-ranking Republican in Clinton administration

Source: Times reports