A House panel report has found significant ethical lapses at the Department of the Interior that have resulted in irregularities and inconsistencies in how or whether department employees recuse themselves from promoting green energy projects where there was a notable conflict of interest.
The report highlights a case in which the legal counsel to then-Interior Secretary Ken Salazar “promoted a renewable energy project” to the White House that involved the employer of his girlfriend. When the department’s senior ethics officer tried to intervene, she was told not to interact or advise political appointees “without receiving management approval.”
Republicans, who are in the majority in the House, conducted the two-year investigation and outlined details they say show a need ethics to improve at the department.
Among the findings:
• The department suffers from delays in reviewing employee financial disclosure forms, in some cases, taking up to 400 days to look over and approve forms for two senior officials. The department also lacks the ability to properly track recusals, making it harder to enforce them.
• No financial disclosure forms were provided in some cases. “It is unclear, for example, how a number of officials who joined the department from the private sector, law firms and advocacy groups recused themselves from matters involving their former employers or clients,” the report found.
The report includes the case of former Bureau of Land Management Director Robert Abbey. He was recused from interacting with his former consulting firm, but “he continued to interact with his former business partners on both personal matters and official business.”
According to the report, one former business partner even acted “as a go between” and “informal advisor” to Abbey.
The legal counsel, Steve Black, who touted his the green energy project from his girlfriend’s company, NextEra Energy, only reported his relationship to the ethics department after his girlfriend, a lobbyist, transferred from the company’s California office to its Washington office. After that, he continued for six months to meet with company officials about the project.
