A State Department
memo, issued in December 2019, says agency employees cannot "engage in political activity in concert with a partisan candidate, political party, or partisan political group." The memo specifically bars high-level State Department officials from participating in a convention.
"Senate-confirmed Presidential appointees may not even attend a political party convention or convention-related event," reads the memo, which was released Monday evening by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel, D-N.Y.
And just last month, Pompeo himself warned State Department employees against engaging in restricted political activity. “It is important that the Department’s employees do not improperly engage the Department of State in the political process, and that they adhere to the Hatch Act and Department policies in their own political activities," he wrote in a
July 24 cable released by Engel.
