Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Brock Long said on Sunday that Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has never pushed him to step down amid an investigation into his use of government cars.
“In regards to Secretary Nielsen, I’ve never been asked to resign,” Long said during an interview with CBS News. “Secretary Nielsen and I talk every day, we have a very professional, functional relationship.”
Long is the subject of a DHS inspector general probe into his use of federal vehicles to travel to and from his home in Hickory, N.C., and Washington on the weekends. Politico reported Thursday that Long used a staff driver for the six-hour drives and his aides stayed in a hotel at taxpayers’ expense. But Long on Sunday pushed back on the news outlet’s report that he and Nielsen, who oversees his agency, had clashed over his trips.
“We’ll make meaningful changes,” he said. “I would never intentionally violate any rules that I was aware of.”
Long is in charge of FEMA’s response to Hurricane Florence, which has dumped record-breaking amounts of rain on the Carolinas since making land fall on Friday.
