A former counselor to then-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke “misused their position” by helping several friends with energy-related meetings and presentations, Interior Department investigators say in a report made public today.
The unnamed counselor during the Trump administration also “failed to comply” with notification requirements concerning negotiations for post-Interior employment with an oil company, the Office of Inspector General reported.
But while identifying several missteps, the OIG investigators concluded the former highly placed adviser did not violate federal conflict-of-interest provisions or the executive branch ethics pledge.
In one incident examined by the OIG, the then-counselor assisted a friend in obtaining a meeting in 2017 between senior officials with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and an energy company — which was a former law client of the counselor — and its business partner.
“Even though we found that the former counselor misused their position by arranging the meeting in 2017, we did not find evidence that the former counselor personally and substantially participated in that or any other meeting or in communications with their former client,” the OIG stated.
The energy company and its business partner were seeking to discuss their joint project, as well as their efforts to have that project covered by streamlined permitting under an Interior program.
The OIG investigators added that they “also found that the former counselor misused...
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