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.”