The Interior Department’s inspector general has found that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke violated the department’s travel policy, Politico and The Washington Post reported Thursday.
Zinke confirmed to investigators that “his staff had researched the implications of making [his wife Lola] a volunteer,” the Post reported, quoting the inspector general’s report — an effort, some Interior employees said, that could have been seen as an excuse to pay for her travel.
TPM has reached out to the Inspector General’s office to confirm the report’s conclusions.
The Post also reported that Zinke improperly allowed his wife to travel in government vehicles, and that he told his security detail “to drive an associate to the airport,” in the paper’s words.
The Post added that, per the IG report, Zinke’s decision to take a security detail on vacation with his family to Turkey cost taxpayers $25,000.
The Interior Department on Thursday denied reports — spurred at first by an internal email from Ben Carson, secretary of Housing and Urban Development — that Interior’s current acting inspector general, Mary Kendall, would be replaced with a HUD political appointee, Suzanne Israel Tufts.
The investigation into Zinke’s travel practices was one of several inspector general probes into his actions as secretary.
This is crazier by the minute.
Reading between the lines, Zinke and Carson were trying to protect Zinke from a report they knew was coming.
The PRESIDENT has the ability under the Vacancy Act to fill in an empty job with another official (and the IG was only “acting” so the job is vacant in a formal sense) who has been confirmed by Congress, but Zinke and Carson don’t have that power.
Obviously the two crooks got together and decided to hatch a scheme to put someone friendly into the position. But Carson is too big of a fool to actually execute even his small part of the conspiracy, and let the cat out of the bag before they got White House sign off… The blowback started immediately and someone in the White House realized what a disaster this was either because an IG report was comming out, or the IG decided to rush the only competed part of their investigation to try to protect themselves.
This was not a “mistake” or Carson getting out over his skis, it is a cover-up that was stopped midway. This is the type of palace intrigue you would expect from a dying authoritarian regime, not a well functioning democracy.
And P.s. I don’t doubt that Zinke and Carson thought they had Trump onboard, and they probably even talked to him about it, but that is meaningless since he has no idea what was going on, and once his staff made clear how this was blowing up, no way they get a sign off from him.
P.s.s. This screams out for oversight…
Good to know our taxes are going to help a Republican not pay taxes or, well… for anything.
It’s gonna cost a lot more after they open their luggage and find bone saws, etc.
That’s exactly what Ben Carson requested! Except, he asked that it be “overlooked.”
Just another cheap crook in the Trump “Administration.”