Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said he had no involvement in Puerto Rico’s decision to award a $300 million contract to Whitefish Energy, the White House said Friday.
President Trump “did ask Secretary Zinke, just for clarification purposes, and he reiterated once again that we have no role, the federal government, and that specifically he had no role in that contract,” said White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders. Whitefish is based in the same small Montana town that Zinke is from, and it had two employees when Hurricane Maria hit the island territory.
Sanders reiterated several times at Friday’s press briefing that the federal government had no role in the contract award and that it was a decision made solely by the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority.
She said the White House will wait for the completion of a federal audit of PREPA’s decision to award the contract to the energy firm to repair 100 miles of transmission lines.
The Federal Emergency Management Administration said Friday it is looking into the contract, saying PREPA’s decision raised “significant concerns” about how the island’s state-run utility made the decision. FEMA said it was not involved in the decision-making process and no FEMA funds were provided to the island to award the contract.
Both top Republicans and Democrats in Congress are asking PREPA and Whitefish to deliver answers on how and why the contract was awarded, while others sent letters to the Government Accountability Office and the Department of Homeland Security to start investigations into the deal.
PREPA’s governing board earlier Friday approved a motion to reject the U.S. territory’s fiscal control board’s plan to place a “chief transformation officer” to oversee the island’s grid repairs, which was smashed by Hurricane Maria.
