"Only a few short weeks after President Donald Trump nominated David Bernhardt, a former oil and agriculture industry lobbyist, to run the Interior Department, the agency is facing a slew of new allegations that top officials violated federal ethics rules by keeping cozy ties to their former employers.
A lengthy ethics complaint filed Wednesday by the Campaign Legal Center, a Washington, D.C.-based watchdog group, outlines “a disturbing pattern of misconduct” at the scandal-plagued Interior Department, including meetings that violate the White House’s own ethical pledge and good governance standards.
The Campaign Legal Center used public records, some of which were first obtained by The Intercept, to lodge the complaint against six top Interior Department officials, including Benjamin Cassidy, a top official at the department’s external affairs office and former National Rifle Association lobbyist; Assistant Secretary for Insular Affairs Douglas Domenech; White House liaison Lori Mashburn, a former Heritage Foundation staffer; and others."
Jimmy Tobias and Jesse Coleman report for the Intercept February 20, 2019.
SEE ALSO:
"Habitat For Sale: An Oil And Gas Group Calls The Tune At The Interior Department" (Yahoo! News)
"Top Leader at Interior Dept. Pushes a Policy Favoring His Former Client" (New York Times)
"Interior Officials Accused Of Violating Ethics Pledge" (The Hill)
"How Growing Up In The West Shaped Bernhardt" (Greenwire)
"Dems Demand Details On Acting Interior Secretary Bernhardt's Meetings" (CNN)
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