Wednesday, February 21, 2001

By Sandra Jontz
Washington bureau

Linda Tripp

WASHINGTON — Linda R. Tripp won’t be heading to Germany to assume a prestigious U.S. government job.

Officials at the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies in Garmisch, Germany, instead hired Springfield, Va., resident Gerald Behnke as the new deputy director for the center’s conference center.

Behnke will begin April 9, said center spokesman Steve Stromvall, who could not provide any information about the new hire, such as his qualifications or pertinent professional history.

Behnke, who got the job over three other candidates — including Tripp — did not return a phone call Tuesday.

Last month, Tripp’s lawyers filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court against the U.S. government and the Department of Defense claiming Pentagon officials leaked news of her interest in the Marshall Center job to sabotage her chance to return to the federal payroll.

Tripp, who gained national notoriety in 1998 as a whistleblower on the President Clinton-Monica Lewinsky affair and again recently when she was dismissed from the Pentagon, was in Germany interviewing for the Marshall Center post when the suit was filed.

No court hearing date has been set, and her lawyers did not return a phone call seeking comment.

During a recent interview on CNN’s Larry King Live, Tripp said she was certain the news of her interview plans, first reported in the Stars and Stripes, ended her chances at getting the job at the "sensitive think tank."

"It’s more than cooked," she said. "I — this was my last, best chance to resume my government career, and it was over. I now know it’s over."

Tripp told King she was horrified when someone handed her a copy of the newspaper — and then asked for her autograph, she quipped.

When President Bush assumed the White House in January, Tripp said she was forced to leave her $98,000-a-year Defense Department job after she refused to tender a letter of resignation, traditionally done by federal political appointees.

Tripp first acknowledged on the cable show that, at the time she was dismissed, she was technically classified as a political appointee. But she maintains her government status was changed as a vendetta for her role in the President Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal.

"My position is that I’m not a political appointee. You can’t make someone a political appointee just to silence them," she told King.

In 1998, Tripp gave audiotapes of her conversations with Lewinsky to Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr, whose investigation ultimately led to Clinton’s impeachment. Clinton was acquitted by the U.S. Congress.

Center spokesman Stromvall declined to comment further about the selection process or about Tripp.

He did not know when Tripp was notified that she did not get the job, but said standard procedures require that all candidates are notified in writing.

Behnke will work under conference center director Col. Franz-Xaver Lauterer, a Germany air force officer.

The newly created position of deputy director of the conference center, established in September, is a GS-14 level and pays between $67,765 and $88,096 a year. The main duties are to schedule conferences and seminars and manage the conference center budget.

The Marshall Center, which falls under the Department of Army, was created in 1994 to teach democracy and defense issues to military leaders from 44 countries who take the courses.

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