Leah Millis/Star-Tribune/AP Photo
A senior Bureau of Land Management official has become embroiled in a whistleblower case that some observers say could test the Biden administration’s commitment to improve relations with BLM career employees after a turbulent four years of the Trump presidency.
At issue is the Trump-era case of Walter Loewen, a former BLM planning and environmental specialist who was disciplined in November 2019. He argues it was in retaliation for raising concerns to his superiors about the impacts to migratory birds from a massive Converse County oil and gas drilling project in Wyoming that was a top priority for the Trump administration. He was ultimately fired in November 2021.
Nada Culver, BLM’s deputy director of policy and programs, is scheduled to testify Tuesday at a Merit Systems Protection Board hearing regarding Loewen’s appeal of his firing.
Culver’s testimony at the hearing could place her in an uncomfortable situation: She actively opposed the Converse County Oil and Gas Project while serving as a senior official with the National Audubon Society prior to joining BLM in March 2021. Culver co-wrote a formal comment letter in July 2019 that mirrored the concerns raised by Loewen when he was working on the bureau’s analysis of the project.
Former Interior Secretary David Bernhardt issued a record of decision approving the project in late 2020 (E&E News PM, Dec. 23, 2020).
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