Roger Johnson, 70; O.C. Republican Joined Clinton
Roger W. Johnson, who as a high-ranking Republican in the Clinton administration led the U.S. General Services Administration from 1993 to 1996, has died. He was 70. Johnson, the former chairman of Western Digital in Irvine, died Friday at his Laguna Beach home of lung cancer.
The wealthy entrepreneur made national headlines in 1992 by becoming one of eight prominent Orange County Republicans to endorse Democrat Bill Clinton for president over the incumbent, George H.W. Bush. After Clinton was elected, he appointed Johnson as administrator of the GSA, the federal government's massive procurement agency, and enlisted him to help "reinvent government."
Johnson later said the GSA job gave him a bird's-eye view of government waste, inefficiency and bad management, fodder for his book, "It Can Be Fixed! Your Unmanaged Government," which was published in July.
He was the highest-ranking Republican to serve in Clinton's first term. Republican Sen. William S. Cohen became Clinton's second-term secretary of defense.
Johnson's relationship with Clinton began in 1991 when he mused to a Times reporter that, as a longtime Republican, he was disillusioned enough with Bush that he would consider voting for the right Democrat. Clinton took him up on the challenge and lobbied Johnson, then a member of an influential Orange County GOP fundraising group, for support.
A year later, Johnson discombobulated the GOP establishment when he co-sponsored a breakfast for Clinton in Newport Beach with several prominent Orange County Republicans. He and seven others later declared their support for Clinton, becoming the first of many notable Republicans to back the Arkansas governor's successful campaign for the presidency.
Johnson resigned as chief executive of Western Digital to lead the GSA, a $10-billion agency with 20,000 employees. He boasted three years later that he had reduced the number of workers by 4,000 and lowered the agency's operating costs by 17%. But he also complained that his management approach set him at odds with longtime bureaucrats, who initiated a string of investigations into his use of public property and alleged improprieties.
He left the GSA in March 1996 and was cleared of all allegations a year later. An earlier GSA audit, requested by Johnson, concluded that he owed the government $72 for improperly using a government credit card and mixing personal and official business on trips.
