Several Democrats noted that Bernhardt has now come under scrutiny almost immediately after taking office.
The Interior Department’s internal watchdog said on Monday it had launched an investigation into several allegations of ethics violations by Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, less than a week after the Senate confirmed him to the position.
Bernhardt had been serving as acting secretary since early January, when then-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke departed amid his own swirl of ethics scandals. Senate Democrats have complained that Bernhardt, a former lobbyist for fossil fuel and agriculture businesses, was not fit to head the agency because of what they deemed as too many conflicts of interest, which they said should require him to recuse himself from much of the agency’s work. Congressional Democrats have also accused him of beingopaque about whether he has met with former clients while in office.
Senate Democrats sent seven different letters to Interior’s inspector general to look into their allegations of conflicts of interest, including Bernhardt’s role in blocking a department report analyzing how a controversial pesticide affected federally protected wildlife, and whether he improperly pushed to remove a species of small fish from the endangered species list to benefit a former client.
