The Interior Department’s Office of Inspector General is reviewing allegations that acting secretary David Bernhardt may have violated his ethics pledge by weighing in on issues affecting a former client, the office confirmed Tuesday.
The move comes as the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is preparing to vote Thursday on whether to confirm Bernhardt as the next interior secretary, after which his nomination is expected to advance to the Senate floor.
At least two outside groups and two Democratic senators asked the agency watchdog to look into Bernhardt’s effort to weaken protections for imperiled fish species and to expand California farmers’ access to water, even though he once lobbied on behalf of a massive agricultural water district that stood to benefit from the changes. The New York Times, The Washington Post and other outlets reported on aspects of Bernhardt’s work.
Bernhardt, who represented Westlands Water District at the firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck before joining the administration in August 2017, has consistently said that he has complied with all federal ethics rules and has not weighed in on particular matters affecting former clients. Under the administration’s ethics pledge, he is recused from specific issues involving a former client for two years, though he can weigh in on policies affecting a broader group of parties.
In an interview, IG spokeswoman Nancy DiPaolo said the office has not yet launched a formal probe. “We’re reviewing the facts and requests to determine appropriate next steps,” she said.
A department spokeswoman said Tuesday that Interior cannot comment on matters pending before the IG’s office.
Several groups, including the Campaign Legal Center and the Campaign for Accountability, as well as Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, have questioned Bernhardt’s role in Interior’s push to conduct an environmental analysis of proposed changes to federal and state water projects in California. That effort that could free up more water for Westlands Water District, which serves farmers in California’s Central Valley.
“It’s important that the inspector general look into this matter and see what happened here,” said Daniel Stevens, executive director of the Campaign for Accountability, who received a letter from the office on Monday.
In response to an earlier inquiry by The Post, Interior released a Feb. 19, 2019, memo signed by two ethics officials at Interior that concludes that Bernhardt’s work on a draft environmental analysis of these water projects did not constitute a “particular matter” that would be covered by his ethics pledge.
But some ethics experts questioned the validity of the memo, which came after the New York Times had reported on details of Bernhardt’s involvement in California water policy. In a March 28 letter to Interior’s acting inspector general, Mary Kendall, officials from the Campaign Legal Center said the memo inaccurately concluded that this work did not constitute a “particular matter” as defined under the federal ethics pledge and that the timing of its release “also raises concerns.”