High-Level Caltrans Hire Draws Fire : Government: Some lawmakers criticize creation of the post and denounce choice of man who played a role in Clinton passport inquiry. Wilson Administration defends decision and lauds appointee’s credentials.

SACRAMENTO —  The Wilson Administration has given a new $78,000 transportation post to a former U.S. State Department official who was involved in last year’s Election Eve search of President Clinton’s passport records.

Michael Brennan, 35, assumed his new duties in June as the state transportation department’s deputy director for external affairs, a post that gives him responsibility for communications and liaison with lawmakers and local government.

The appointment has attracted criticism from some legislative leaders who contend that in a time of employment cutbacks and budget shortages, the Republican Administration should not be creating high-paying jobs, much less giving them to “someone who was involved in one of the most embarrassing episodes in State Department history,” said Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar).

Brennan, a 12-year veteran of government service with extensive experience in communications, vigorously defended his credentials. He declined to discuss his involvement in the passport episode, other than to say his actions were accurately portrayed in a lengthy report by the State Department’s inspector general.

The report said Brennan was one of four State Department officials dispatched during the height of last year’s presidential campaign to search confidential passport files for any evidence that Clinton had sought to renounce his American citizenship during the Vietnam War. No such evidence was found, and the inspector general labeled the search a heinous activity designed to influence the election’s outcome.

The report said Brennan, then the director of public affairs in the Bureau of Consular Affairs, was not involved until the second day of the search, when he was ordered to monitor the examination of the Clinton documents to ensure that none of the contents of the files were tampered with.

Because Brennan was a political appointee, the inspector general said Brennan’s involvement was particularly inappropriate, but noted that Brennan had not “volunteered . . . to take such actions” and was carrying out his superiors’ orders. Unlike some of the others involved, Brennan was not recommended for disciplinary action.

Spokesmen for Gov. Pete Wilson and Transportation Director James W. van Loben Sels said California officials were aware of Brennan’s role in the passport incident but decided, because he had never been charged with misconduct or disciplined for wrongdoing, that it would have no bearing on their decision to hire him.

“It’s a non-issue,” said Caltrans spokesman Jim Drago.

But the chairmen of the Senate and Assembly transportation committees said they were concerned that the appointment smacked of politics.

“It’s outrageous that someone who violates the trust of the State Department and engages in blatantly political affairs . . . would be given a high-ranking position in the Wilson Administration,” Katz said.

Sen. Quentin L. Kopp (I-San Francisco) said his prime concern was that the Administration was filling a high-paying position in a time of budget austerity. “We just voted on taking monies from counties and cities and special districts. This flies in the face of the Administration’s protestations about cutting state government,” he said.

Wilson spokesman Dan Schnur said the Administration has over the years eliminated many jobs and left others unfilled, including some in the transportation department, but “you’ve got to fill some of them just to make government function.”

He described Brennan as highly qualified, noting that he had held similar federal jobs in the Social Security Administration, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Department of Labor.

“Michael Brennan was the most qualified person for the job. He could have been Michael Dukakis’ chief of staff and he would still have gotten the job,” Schnur said, referring to the former Democratic presidential contender.

A Caltrans spokesman said, however, that Brennan was the only job candidate interviewed by the department. He said the director found Brennan, whose name was forwarded to him by the governor’s office, to be so qualified that he saw no reason to interview anyone else.