The following article by Emily Holden, Alex Guillén and Kelsey Tamborrino was posted on the Politico website April 26, 2018 and updated June 20, 2018:
From Chick-fil-A to a stay in a lobbyist’s condo, these are the ethical quandaries spurring investigations into the EPA chief’s conduct.
Spending
His first-class flights, round-the-clock security, new SUV and sweep for bugs have raised questions.
AIDES RUNNING ERRANDS
Pruitt had two scheduling aides taking care of personal business for him, which they have contended was done on their own time – but would be a potential violation of laws prohibiting such work, which is considered an illegal gift. One of his former schedulers, Sydney Hupp, worked in May and June of 2017 to set up a meeting between Pruitt and Chick-fil-A to discuss the possibility of his wife Marlyn opening a franchise of the popular chicken eatery.
The Washington Post first reported on the Chick-fil-A emails. Another scheduling aide, Millan Hupp (Sydney’s sister), told House investigators in May that she also conducted personal business for Pruitt, including exploring whether Pruitt could purchase a used mattress from the Trump International Hotel. Hupp said she also contacted housing agents and visited several properties as Pruitt sought a more permanent abode and booked personal travel, such as a trip to the Rose Bowl.
PRICEY FLIGHTS
Pruitt has spent at least $105,000 on first-class flights,arguing that he needs to travel away from other passengers because of threats to his safety. He and his staff have also flown on private charter and military flights at a cost of $58,000. On one international trip, he took Emirates airlines, one of the most luxurious in the world. A House Oversight Committee probe includes Pruitt’s travel policies.
Records of Pruitt’s flights
24/7 SECURITY
Pruitt has spent millions of dollars on a round-the-clock,20-person security detail that accompanies him even on personal travel — vastly more protection than his predecessors received — including his visits to a college football game and Disneyland. EPA in May said that security spending during Pruitt’s year was nearly $3.5 million, a major jump from annual spending under the Obama administration.
EPA also spent $30,000 on a private security detail while Pruitt was on government business in in Italy, according to a fired whistleblower, and $45,000 for employees to travel to Australia ahead of Pruitt for a trip he later had to cancel.
An internal report by EPA’s homeland security office cast doubt on whether Pruitt has really faced threats that would justify his security expenses. The agency later removed the staffer who signed off on that report.
House Oversight Chairman Trey Gowdy’s (R-S.C.) request for an investigation of security and spending
$43K PHONE BOOTH
EPA spent $43,000 installing a soundproof booth in Pruitt’s office to let him speak on the phone without fear of eavesdropping, even though the agency’s headquarters already had two secure communications facilities elsewhere in the building. The Government Accountability Office says EPA illegally violated spending limits on the office upgrade without notifying Congress.
GAO report on EPA’s illegal phone booth
EXPENSIVE DOORS
Pruitt has had biometric locks installed on his office doors for $5,700. The agency also paid $2,460 to repair the door to Pruitt’s Capitol Hill condo, which security agents had broken down on a Wednesday afternoon when they feared he was unconscious.
Records of Pruitt’s office renovation expenses, obtained through litigation by the group American Oversight.
HIGH-END SUV
EPA spent $10,200 for a one-year lease on a new, bigger SUV for Pruitt but has denied news reports that the 2017 Chevy Suburban included bulletproof tires and seat covers. However, records show the agency is seeking expensive, low-visibility bulletproof vests for its protective service detail.
SUV order form
AND THERE’S MORE…
The agency spent $3,000 to sweep Pruitt’s offices for listening devices — a job that went to a business partner of Pruitt’s top security agent, Nino Perrotta, The Washington Post reported. EPA also looked into whether to spend $100,000 a month for a private plane for Pruitt and $70,000 on bulletproof desks, although it ultimately didn’t go ahead with those items. Pruitt also spent $3,230 on personalized fountain pens and journals from a Washington jewelry store.
Secrecy
The agency keeps Pruitt’s travel and meetings under wraps. And the White House was unaware when some of his aides got huge raises.
SURPRISE TRIPS
EPA refuses to disclose Pruitt’s speaking or travel plans in advance, in a sharp break from the practices of previous agency leaders — including a visit to Georgia this week to announce a change in forest policy, and a trip to Morocco last year where he promoted exports of U.S. natural gas. The agency has also fought requests for calendars that would reveal details of his activities and meetings after the fact, bringing a flurry of lawsuits from activist groups and news organizations.
BACKDOOR RAISES
Pruitt’s closest political aides got raises of as high as 72.3 percent even after the White House refused to approve pay increases for the employees. The agency used an obscure provision of a drinking water law to provide the money. Pruitt has maintained he didn’t know about the raises, and his chief of staff has claimed responsibility.
Initial inspector general’s finding on raises
SECRET EMAILS
The Oklahoma Bar Association has said it wouldexamine accusations that Pruitt lied to lawmakersduring his confirmation hearing last year when he said he had not used private email addresses to conduct government business when he was Oklahoma’s attorney general. Senate Environment Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) is investigating Pruitt’s use of multiple EPA email addresses, a practice that earlier provoked controversy for Obama-era Administrator Lisa Jackson.
Oklahoma Bar Association letter
A NO-SHOW AIDE?
Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) has asked EPA’s inspector general to investigate allegations that Pruitt’s top policy aide, Samantha Dravis, “did not attend work or perform her duties” for months in late 2017 and early this year. EPA called the accusation “completely baseless and absurd.”
Carper’s inquiry about Samantha Dravis
TOXIC CHEMICAL STUDY
EPA staff and the White House worked to block publication of a federal health study on water contamination after a Trump administration aide warned that the findings would cause a “public relations nightmare,” emails provided to POLITICO revealed. The study, eventually released after a bipartisan outcry by an arm of the Department of Health and Human Services, shows that chemicals used in products like Teflon and firefighting foam endanger human health at a far lower level than EPA has previously called safe. The chemicals have been linked with thyroid defects, problems in pregnancy and certain cancers and have leached into water supplies near military bases, chemical plants and other sites.
Industry Ties
He’s tight with industries that EPA regulates.
CONDO-GATE
Pruitt rented a Capitol Hill condo for several months last year from the wife of an energy lobbyist, at an unusually generous rate of $50 for any night he happened to stay there. He insisted that the lobbyist, J. Steven Hart, had no clients with business before EPA — but Hart’s firm contradicted that claim when it disclosed that Hart had in fact lobbied the agency on issues related to Chesapeake Bay. EPA subsequently acknowledged that Pruitt had met with Hart and a former executive of the meat processor Smithfield Foods in July, although the agency says Pruitt did not consider the encounter to meet the definition of lobbying. Hart’s firm later updated its disclosures to clarify that Hart had lobbied EPA in 2017 for two more clients, Coca-Cola and the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico. By all accounts, the relationship with the Harts was not an entirely pleasant one: Pruitt was slow to pay his rent at times, and his lobbyist landlords had to change the locks to ensure he would stay away.
Lobbying disclosure by Hart’s firm
CORPORATE ACCESS
Pruitt has filled the agency’s top ranks with lobbyists and executives seeking to roll back regulations in favor of the industries they represented — including a former American Chemistry Council official who now shapes policy on chemical safety. His frequent travelsand meetings in D.C. include industry representatives and other people who could be helpful to him in a future campaign for Oklahoma senator, or even president. For example, the New York Times reportedrecently on Pruitt’s frequent meetings with billionaire coal executive Joseph Craft, who let Pruitt and his son use his exclusive seats to watch a key University of Kentucky basketball game in December.
Meanwhile, companies with an interest in the EPA’s policies are finding a friendly ear at the agency: GOP mega-donor Sheldon Adelson got an Israeli company a meeting with Pruitt, and now the agency is studying its technology for extracting water from the air. Homebuilders paid for Pruitt’s stay in a luxury hotellast fall when he traveled to Colorado Springs to speak at their meeting, and he later instructed his staff to regard the builders as EPA’s “customers.” EPA also relied on a questionable industry study, paid for by a trucking company, to push through a pollution loophole for retrofitted trucks.
The GAO is also investigating Pruitt’s appearance in a beef group’s video opposing an EPA water rule.
Calendars showing meetings with coal executive, fundraiser
OKLAHOMA CONNECTIONS
Reporting by The Intercept and The New York Times has raised a wealth of questions about Pruitt’s past as a state lawmaker and attorney general in Oklahoma — including lavish spending in the AG’s office, lobbyists and executives who helped him buy expensive homesand part of a minor league baseball team, and a former Oklahoma banker who now leads Pruitt’s Superfund task force despite being banned for life from the banking industry by the FDIC.
One of his longtime Oklahoma allies, Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe, told POLITICO he finds some of the recent revelations troubling and worth investigating.
FDIC document barring Kelly from further involvement in banking
HUGH HEWITT
Pruitt put a California toxic-waste cleanup on the fast track after conservative pundit Hugh Hewitt asked him to meet with lawyers for a local water district seeking federal aid for the Orange County project. Hewitt, an Orange County resident whose son James works in EPA’s press office, did not attend the meeting — but he has been a vocal defender of Pruitt’s, dismissing his controversies as “nonsense scandals” on MSNBC.
Following POLITICO’s reporting on the incident, MSNBC said it had given Pruitt a “verbal warning as such activity is a violation of our standards,” and Washington Post editorial page editor Fred Hiatt said his newspaper would no longer allow Hewitt to write about Pruitt.
EPA email confirming the Oct. 18 meeting
LOBBYIST-PLANNED TRAVEL
Lobbyists and other D.C. power brokers have helped plan Pruitt’s controversial overseas travel as well as some trips that never took place. Those include former Comcast lobbyist Richard Smotkin, who according to The New York Times and the Washington Post helped arrange Pruitt’s Morocco trip last year and accompanied him on the journey. (Smotkin subsequently won a $40,000-a-month lobbying contract with the Moroccan government.)
Meanwhile, Federalist Society executive Leonard Leo helped plan Pruitt’s trip to Italy last year, accompanying him to an expensive restaurant in Rome and a private Mass at the Vatican, and former lobbyist Matthew Freedman set up meetings in Australia for Pruitt for a trip that was later canceled.
Illustrations by Patterson Clark.