‘Let’s face it, they dodged a bullet’ — Leon Panetta explained what exactly went wrong for Lloyd Austin

One of the most immediate fallouts of the Lloyd Austin saga will come tomorrow, when all Cabinet agencies must submit their procedures for delegating authority to the White House.

They will do so in response to an order from chief of staff Jeff Zients, who demanded as much after the Defense secretary’s secret hospitalization sparked questions about transparency and ensuring lines of succession.

To break down this particular element of an ever-expanding story, West Wing Playbook called Leon Panetta, who served both as White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton and secretary of Defense under Barack Obama. This conversation has been edited for length.

What’s gone through your mind has you’ve followed this story? 

Lloyd Austin has done a great job as secretary of Defense. He’s had to deal with a lot of critical issues and be on the road dealing with our allies pretty much full time. But it’s precisely because he’s important to our national security, and a key part of the chain of command, that I think it’s very important for him to have notified the president, the national security team, and obviously the public if in any way he’s incapacitated.

He’s accepted responsibility and said he’s going to do a better job. Look, I’ve been in and out of Washington for over 50 years. There’s a lesson that is always very hard to learn in Washington, which is that you're always better off telling the truth. And if you in any way try to avoid it, the truth is eventually going to come out. And you’ll pay a price.

How did this communication work for you when you were in these roles? 

When I was chief of staff, it was the case that people in the Cabinet called me and gave me a heads-up if they were either going to be gone, leave town for a while or be hospitalized. We had a policy that that should be the case.

And when I was in the Obama administration, I would stay in pretty regular touch with Rahm Emmanuel, who was chief of staff, both with regards to where I was going, but also the operations I was involved with.

So there wasn’t a handbook on your first day laying out those expectations on the delegation of power and communication? It’s more of an understanding?

There’s been a gradual deterioration here with regards to the role of the Cabinet. Because so much authority is centralized in the White House these days, the Cabinet really only comes together usually for a press briefing by the president.

Normally, what should be the case is there’s a secretary to the Cabinet, and there should be regular meetings with the Cabinet to not only inform them about issues going on but also to stay in touch with them, so that they feel like they’re part of the team. As that relationship generally has been strained in the last number of years, I think everybody kind of operates on their own. You saw a little bit of that happen here.

Do you believe Zients needed this review to ensure there’s formal policy in place?  

Absolutely. It’s one of those things that I’m sure a lot of people take for granted, but you really do need to have a formal policy.

As chief of staff, how did you ensure your expectations for Cabinet members were clear?

In many ways, what I did was to try to become a surrogate for the president in dealing with the Cabinet. You have to go out of your way to maintain that kind of relationship.

I can only imagine remote capabilities and technological advances make that more challenging. 

Oh yeah, everybody’s on Zoom. Everybody’s on a laptop. And you avoid that personal touch, which I think it’s true in government and in business.

When you were Defense secretary, to what extent did someone always know your whereabouts? 

I made sure that my chief of staff informed the White House whenever we took a trip anywhere, whether it was in the country visiting a base or whether it was overseas. And usually informed the national security adviser as well.

Look, I have a lot of experience in government. And I just always felt it was much better to keep the White House fully informed so that they wouldn’t be blindsided. That’s why I said protocols are very important. You can kind of stand back and say, “Well shit, that’s kind of common sense, for Christ’s sake.” But it isn’t always common sense. People are all busy. They’re all doing their own thing. You suddenly have a trip where you’re going to do something in your Cabinet position, and the last thing you think about is informing the White House because that’s the habit that’s developed. That’s what you can’t afford to have happen.

So how would you handle the fallout from all of this? 

This is a case where it seems that responsibility falls on a number of shoulders, and so you can’t very well clean house going up to the president. But at the very least you could try — and I think Austin did that to some extent, by accepting responsibility for the screw-up and making it clear that he could’ve done a better job.

Let’s face it, they dodged a bullet because if something had happened in that gap that was created, that could’ve been a serious event.

You mention Austin taking responsibility. But then, we found out the president wasn’t informed until this week about the original reasoning behind his health issues. 

There is a tendency to kind of say, “Well look, this is a private matter, I don’t have to tell anybody.” But the problem is, you’re secretary of Defense. You have a huge responsibility to the public.

Does this alter his relationship with the White House? 

Because it’s a personal matter, obviously related to cancer, I don’t think so. I think if it were a difference on a major policy decision, national security, then it becomes a different matter. But these kinds of things — no matter how big or small — they are always going to have some impact on the relationship because the White House is going to wonder in the future whether they’re getting the full truth.

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