Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility claims that Margaret Everson was illegally appointed to act as the National Park Service director/DOI
Margaret Everson, counselor to Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, was illegally placed in charge of the National Park Service, according to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.
Everson was named acting director for the Park Service on August 7 when Bernhardt announced she was replacing David Vela, who had been acting director since October 2019.
"The latest maneuver to evade Senate confirmation for the National Park Service’s top official violates the law according to a newly-amended federal suit filed (Thursday) by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and Western Watersheds Project (WWP)," a press release from PEER said Thursday.
U.S. District Court Judge Tanya S. Chutkan gave the Trump administration until September 14 to file its response.
The Trump administration is already facing similar legal challenges in other agencies, including, most notably, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, the Office of Surface Mining, and the Department of Homeland Security."
A PEER/WWP lawsuit filed earlier this summer to challenge the continued tenure of William Perry Pendley atop BLM had also faulted Vela’s designation at the Park Service. The group's press release said the new complaint removes Vela from the matter and charges that Everson appointment violates the Federal Vacancies Reform Act because the Park Service director is a position requiring “advice and consent” of the U.S. Senate under the Constitution, and that it may only be filled on a temporary basis by:
• A qualified official appointed directly by the President, not Secretary Bernhardt, or
• The “first assistant” to the former Director. "
Everson was not appointed by President Trump. She came to the Park Service from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, where she had served as principle deputy director since November 2018.
PEER's release pointed out that Everson had never worked for the Park Service before her sudden appointment, adding that "(T)his will be the first presidential term since the Park Service was created in 1917 in which it will have no actual Director."
“To name someone to act as Park Service Director who does not even work in the Service is a real mindblower,” said PEER Senior Counsel Peter Jenkins, noting that Everson signed her introductory email to all NPS employees as “Counselor to the Secretary Exercising the Delegated Authority of the Director.”
“With the enactment of the Great American Outdoors Act the National Park Service should have even greater prominence, but it has been reduced to a secondary bureau in David Bernhardt’s back office," added Jenkins.
The Federal Vacancies Reform Act provides that actions taken by noncompliant officials are “without force or effect” and may not later be ratified. On that basis, a federal court recently invalidated actions by “acting” DHS Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli. On that same basis, the Government Accountability Office has also ruled that “acting” DHS Secretary Chad Wolf is not qualified to occupy his position.
“Trump’s repeated attempts to evade Senate confirmation create chaos and will likely spawn more lawsuits nullifying official actions by illegal appointees,” said Jenkins, pointing out the legality of any action by Everson will now be called into question. “The National Park Service desperately needs real leadership rather than just another temp.”
Comments
I applaud PEER and WWP for taking on this issue. I have already expressed my own opinion of the current administration's disgraceful conduct with regard to these "dark-of-night" placements of unqualified and unethical shills on top of educated and trained agency employees who have spent many hard years working their ways up through the hierarchy in order to be there and appropriately in contention for these positions. I'm disgusted that these shills actually stoop so low as to accept these assignments. They must know that the only reason they're in there is to do the corrupt business of this lawless administration, this racketeer influenced corrupt organization, when ethical public servants who should be in contention for these positions would balk.
And, I wish this was an isolated incident; but, as I have said before, there is now a pattern and practice of these increasingly "abnormal" decisions being made all across our federal government. Much of this "abnormality' has been right there in the Department of the Interior (DOI), the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and the NPS. There is litigation pending or under development against recent actions to undermine the National Environmental Policy Act (NPA), against similar actions to erode the Endangered Species Act (ESA), as well as against the revolving door of midnight ousters and sleazy promotions that have been taking place throughout the DOI, leaving rightwing operatives like Margaret, the rightwing lawyer who has no field management experience in the parks and has only been accumulating NPS experience for a couple of weeks, in "acting" positions everywhere.
But, again, Margaret who has lost her moral compass isn't even the only example in the NPS. As I posted previously, let's not forget Daniel Smith, who the now disgraced former Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke made "acting" NPS Director despite a freshly inked IG report citing Smith's record of undue and corrupt interference. Then, David Vela got to be "acting" NPS Director for a little while, during which time Zinke's successor, Secretary Bernhardt, keyed up Edward Keable, another of his rightwing personal legal counselors with no substantive park management time or experience, to take the helm as superintendent at Grand Canyon just as a legal battle over foreign real estate developers with republican connections started heating up at Tusayan south of that park.
And, the lawlessness doesn't end there. As so many of us have been lamenting, this administration violates the Hatch Act so frequently and Attorney General Barr is so consistently complicit that the act will have to be rewritten, restrengthened, renewed, and reauthorized just to bring it back to life. Subpoenas, does anyone remember when subpoenas meant something? The emoluments clause and prohibitions against Conflict of Interest, remember when those were a big deal?
The intent of this administration has clearly been to undermine the rule of law across the board ...you know, to make America function just like Putin and his oligarch friends operate Russia and Xi and his party associates operate China. And, as I've also said before, it isn't just Trump. No, republicans, republican enablers, and republican appointees are the problem. If we get rid of Trump, but leave the Senate in republican hands, we won't have accomplished anything close to what is needed. We need to hold the House and take both the executive branch and the Senate. We need to vote this November or as soon as we can in our individual jurisdictions and we need to remember that our problem isn't just Trump; it's an entire corrupt political party, from Greg Gianforte and Steve Daines in the north, to Cory Gardner and Ken Buck in the middle, to Lindsey Graham and Ron DeSantis in the south. They're all, in one way or another, hellbent on using malice or ignorance or both to pillage and destroy this country, either deliberately or through a truly ridiculous level of bumbling, stumbling, drooling incompetence. So, don't just sit there, get up and vote!
What a waste of time and money. I won't argue the "legality" as I don't know enough about the intricacies of the Vacancies reform act. What if it is illegal and she is thrown out? Then what? A Director or acting Director with similar philosophies will be appointed. Of course PEER will just throw more money down the drain going after them for what ever reason. First they complain about continuity and then they want to throw out Acting Director after Acting Director without any real evidence an Acting Director is any less effective than a Director. They all serve at the discretion of the President so regardless of the title they are all "acting". As to the fact she didn't come from the park service, the argument is specious. It is common if not the norm for CEOs to come to their current company from outside the industry. Their skills are not in producing the end product but rather the creation and management of the organization. PEER would have far more credibility if it spent its money on things that actually help the parks. Perhaps they could come up with a match to the $6 billion that Senator Gardner and President Trump generated for the NPS.
Whoa there, ecbuck, according to this new line of "thought" so to speak of yours, seeking to have this administration follow the laws is just a "waste of time and money" because, even if we succeed, this administration will just appoint another "Director or acting Director" who is just as bad and what's the point anyway? Is that where you're at now?
After all of your and your brethren's high-toned, law and order, patriotism talk, you're down to "resistance is futile" because the racketeer-in-chief and the party that backs him have total control; America is now the racketeer influenced corrupt organization of their dreams, apparently of your dreams as well; and anything and everything is at their "discretion" and they can do as they please? We should all just shut up and accept it as long as they occasionally use our own taxes to throw us a "fix the toilets in the parks" bribe here or there? Is that where you're at now?
At the end of the day and after all of your talk about "principles" and the Constitution, is that where you've really been all along? At the end of the day and after all your talk about liberty, personal freedom, and a government controlled by the people, you're good with just chucking all that talk and switching over to preach a "realpolitik" acceptance of the inevitable? Pragmatic submission to our overlords because "resistance is futile" in the end is now your message?
After you and your ideological brethren have so ferociously ranted against any "nitpicking" emphasis on "process over product" when it comes to the conservationists wanting to use the NEPA process and due process in decision making, you're now defending these shills because their "skills are not in producing the end product but rather the creation and management of the organization" and that's your brave new world?
Did you ever really believe any of the stuff you've been preaching or is this the worthless, two-faced, hypocritical best you've got or maybe really ever had?
So, to conservationists everywhere, it's, again, not just Trump. No, it's folks like this ecbuck character. It's republicans, republican enablers, and republican appointees that are the problem. If we get rid of Trump, but leave the Senate in republican hands, we won't have accomplished anything close to what is needed. We need to hold the House and take both the executive branch and the Senate. We need to vote this November or as soon as we can in our individual jurisdictions and we need to remember that our problem isn't just Trump; it's an entire corrupt political party, from Greg Gianforte and Steve Daines in the north, to Cory Gardner and Ken Buck in the middle, to Lindsey Graham and Ron DeSantis in the south. So, vote!
No Humph, that is not what I am saying. I am saying PEER could spend its money more effectively to advance the parks. Its just that truly advancing the parks isn't their primary interest.
Hump -- the net of what he is saying is that his side is found to be illegal and wrong and our choice should be apathy.
Rick, nobody has been "found" to be illegal of anything. What I am saying is PEER could be better spending their money if they really wanted to help the parks. But go ahead, put words in my mouth that I haven't said. Its your normal MO. Set up the false strawman and attack it. GRRRR
As a 'graduate' of the NPS Office of Whistleblower Crucifixion, I totally support PEER!
EC "sets up" plenty of "false strawmen" himself (GRRRRR!). The mission of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility is not to "advance" the parks, or any other agency:
"About PEER
PEER supports current and former public employees who seek a higher standard of environmental ethics and scientific integrity within their agencies. We do this by defending whistleblowers, shining the light on improper or illegal government actions, working to improve laws and regulations...
All our services are provided pro bono, without charge. Through PEER, public servants can choose to work as “anonymous activists” so that public agencies must confront the message, rather than the messenger. "
https://www.peer.org/about-us/
Tahoma, please tell me how a symbolic chase of a bureaucratic technicality leads to a higher standard of environmental ethics and scientific integrity? They are nothing but an attack dog funding lawyers. The money's spent could be much better served by spending on actual park improvements - whether that is their mission or not. Its funny that an organization that fabricates information is seeking "scientific integrity".