Only three days after being elected to the Loudoun County School Board, it was made public that Leesburg resident Anne Donohue (At-Large) resigned from her Department of Justice job after the U.S. Office of Special Counsel (OSC) found her to be in breach of the Hatch Act.
She resigned Oct. 10 and her last day at the DOJ was Nov. 3.
The Hatch Act prohibits federal employees from running as partisan candidates in elections. The OSC is an independent federal investigative and prosecutorial agency that investigates Hatch Act violations.
Donohue joined the DOJ in 2014 and the Civil Division in 2020 as an appellate litigator, according to her bio on the George Washington University website. She is also a law lecturer for the university.
According to the OSC, Hatch Act violations include accepting an endorsement from a political party while running for a non-partisan office or receiving material assistance from a political party such as campaign signs, campaign literature, and advertising support.
In a recent letter sent from Ana Galindo-Marrone, chief of OSC’s Hatch Act Unit, to the anonymous individual who filed the complaint with the OSC concerning Donohue, Marrone states, “We confirmed that Ms. Donohue was endorsed by the Loudoun County Democratic Committee (LCDC) and that she also acted in concert with the LCDC to further her candidacy.”
The letter went on to say that once OSC informed Donohue of its conclusions that Donohue “came into compliance with the law by resigning her DOJ job,” and that the OSC closed the file without further action.
Republicans quick to question legality
On Nov. 1, the Loudoun County Republican Committee published a post to its website which said, “Her [Donohue’s] acceptance of a political party’s endorsement, her campaign contributions to that same party, her frequent appearances with democrat officials at campaign events, and apparent use of democrat party support, has placed her campaign in blatant violation of the federal law.”
They demanded an investigation.
Individuals took to social media quickly after the OSC letter was posted on the X accounts, formerly Twitter, of Loudoun County Moms and Daily Wire reporter Luke Rosiak, who has written extensively on public school issues.
Many public comments on social media centered on why Donohue would choose to resign from a well paying government career position in order to keep her new position on the school board which is a part time role that only pays $22,000, according to LCPS budget records.
“I’m at peace with my decision”
In an interview with The Blue Ridge Leader Sunday evening, Donohue said she first received notice from the OSC in September alerting her that a complaint had been filed and the office would be investigating the allegations.
“I had been sporadically applying for jobs the last couple of years while working at the DOJ, mostly in the federal sector. Before I joined DOJ, I was a county prosecutor in Massachusetts and that’s the work that I went to law school to do and the job that I have loved the most throughout my career and I really miss it,” Donohue explained.
“And the longer that I spent away from that world, I have missed it more and more. And I had already been thinking that maybe next year I might get a job at one of the Commonwealth Attorneys Offices.”
She said for the last three years she has also been teleworking, but was asked to come back into the DOJ office as of January 2023 and did not look forward to the commute again. As a federal employee she said she also was tired of government shutdowns, which directly impacted her job with funding lapses. “It’s a turn off,” she quipped. “So I had really been thinking for a few years that I would try and get a job locally.”
She said when she was thinking about running for the school board in the spring she had a series of conversations with the ethics officer and the professional responsibility officer at her job, along with her direct supervisor, about the Hatch Act. She also said once her campaign was underway, she communicated to her campaign staff advising them of the restrictions of the Act to make sure they did not unknowingly violate the Act.
“I don’t think I did violate the Hatch Act,” Donohue said, but she did see at times her campaign material was used by others. She saw a picture of one of her signs on a Fourth of July float that she did not put there. Some Democratic events used her candidate material also by well meaning people who were most likely not aware of the law.
“I can only control what I did, and I followed the law. I cannot control other people. I did not ask for the endorsement of the Loudoun County Democratic Committee. The committee did that on their own or did it at the request of someone who entered my name in for consideration,” she said.
The OSC gave her three options – quit the campaign, resign from her DOJ position or appeal the violation decision. “Many people encouraged me to fight the violation decision, but that would have taken the involvement of lawyers and a lot of time and money,” she said. In the end, because she had already been thinking of transitioning out of her job at the DOJ, the answer became clear.
She left the DOJ. And in doing so, it closed the case against her. It was a decision she came to based on the consideration primarily of her family and secondly the future course of her career.
Donohue said she is optimistic about future job prospects and particularly her new role on the school board. As a mother of two young children, she believes she is in the right time and place to affect change for the better.
“I’m at peace,” she said.
The next School Board meeting is Tuesday, Nov. 14 at 4 p.m. at LCPS headquarters, 21000 Education Court in Ashburn. At that meeting, the nine new school board members will be formally introduced to the public. On Jan. 2, 2024, the new school board members will be sworn in.
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