The swaggering guy who commanded his staff to fly an obscure Department of Interior flag with a bison seal every time he was in the office, a guy who ordered the minting of Interior coins with his name on them, a guy who spent tax money on questionable private jet travel together with his wife, a guy who has been involved in a Halliburton development plan for his tiny hometown, a guy who rode roughshod over ethical rules to become the subject of 18 investigations for mixing private and public business and other lapses, will depart his post at the end of this year.
The announcement came this morning the way Donald Trump loves to deliver them: via Twitter. “Secretary of the Interior @RyanZinke will be leaving the Administration at the end of the year after having served for a period of almost two years. Ryan has accomplished much during his tenure and I want to thank him for his service to our Nation.”
One service Zinke has definitely accomplished during his tenure is his deep kowtow to the extractive industries. With his reviews recommending the shrinking of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase national monuments established or expanded by President Obama, and the opening of additional millions of acres of public lands to drilling and mining, Zinke made happy many conservative state officials and the oil and gas industry. But this upset western conservationists who had supported his 2008 Montana Senate race and his 2014 race for Congress.
In those days, however, he looked to be that modern rarity, a green-leaning Republican who had the best environmental record of any of his GOP colleagues. But once in Washington, he quickly adopted Donald Trump’s “energy dominance” agenda.
Jimmy Tobias at The Guardian has produced an excellent investigative piece on Zinke. And there’s this 38-page exposé by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
In his resignation letter, the 57-year-old Zinke whined that “vicious and politically motivated attacks” on him had “created an unfortunate distraction” from the fulfillment of the Interior Department’s mission.
Regarding the shrinking of national monuments that is being contested in the courts, Mark Trahant at Indian Country Today writes:
Except almost immediately a coalition of tribes and environmental groups moved the fight into the federal judiciary. A number of lawsuits will determine if Zinke even had the legal authority to reduce the size of the monuments. As the tribal arguments in the legal proceedings stated: “It was the largest rollback, whether by a president or Congress, of federally protected lands in United States history. The Trump Proclamation provided almost no justification for removing Antiquities Act protections from 1.1 million acres of public lands and tens of thousands of historical objects.”
That case will continue. Probably for years. And, in the meantime, the next secretary will have to notify the court before actual drilling.
Julie Turkewitz and Coral Davenport at The New York Times report:
Rather than an end to Mr. Zinke’s pro-fossil fuel policies, the resignation quite likely signals a passing of the playbook. Mr. Zinke’s deputy, David Bernhardt, a former oil lobbyist, is expected to step in as acting head of the department. [...]
Last year under Mr. Zinke, the United States offered up 12.8 million acres of federally controlled oil and gas parcels for lease, triple the average offered during President Barack Obama’s second term, according to an analysis by The New York Times.
Zinke assigned Bernhardt to take on several significant policy changes including with the Endangered Species Act and drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Like Andrew Wheeler taking over after Scott Pruitt was forced out at the Environmental Protection Agency, Bernhardt can be expected to be less flamboyant but nevertheless follow in Zinke’s policy footsteps, possibly with a more publicly judicious tone.