The Environmental Protection Agency said Thursday morning Administrator Scott Pruitt doesn’t have a “blanket travel waiver” to fly first class, backing away from its original explanation.
An EPA official told the Washington Examiner the agency submits the same security-related waiver for Pruitt to fly first class before each trip. The waiver has to be approved by multiple EPA officials before every trip.
The EPA said Tuesday Pruitt is pre-approved to fly first-class whenever he wants because of security concerns.
“Due to security reasons, he has a blanket waiver to buy business or first class,” spokesman Jahan Wilcox said at the time.
But federal travel rules from the General Services Administration require agencies’ oversight staff to approve first-class travel “on a trip-by-trip basis … unless the traveler has an up-to-date documented disability or special need.”
Indeed, the regulations say, “blanket authorization of other than coach-class transportation accommodations is prohibited and shall be authorized on an individual trip-by-trip basis.”
So GSA does allow Pruitt’s first-class travel for security reasons, but only if the agency requests a waiver for each trip.
“The [General Services Administration] has a provision for security,” EPA spokesman Wilcox said in a statement Thursday. “As such, for every trip Administrator Pruitt submits a waiver to fly in either first or business class.”
Democrats on Wednesday asked the EPA’s inspector general to investigate how Pruitt obtains a waiver to fly first class.
Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, who is the top Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and other committee Democrats urged the EPA’s inspector general to expand an existing probe of Pruitt’s travel habits to include the circumstances behind the waiver.
The investigation currently covers Pruitt’s frequent travel to and from his home state of Oklahoma and his use of private and government planes.
Democratic lawmakers want to know if EPA political appointees or career staff are involved in the approval of a waiver. They also want to understand how the EPA determined flying coach is a security risk and whether other EPA political appointees have been granted exceptions.
Pruitt said Tuesday security-related decisions made by others is prompting him to frequently fly first class or take military flights at taxpayer expense.
“I’m not involved in any of those decisions,” Pruitt said during an interview with the New Hampshire Union Leader. “Those are all made by the [security] detail, the security assessment in addition to the chief of staff.”
“Unfortunately, we’ve had some incidents on travel dating back to when I first started serving in the March-April timeframe,” Pruitt said. “We live in a very toxic environment politically, particularly around issues of the environment,” he said.
Pruitt and his top aides spent more than $90,000 on travel in just the first few weeks of June 2017, according to a report Sunday by the Washington Post.
