BILLINGS, Mont. -- A senior Trump administration official misused his office for private gain by capitalizing on his government connections to help get his son-in-law hired at the Environmental Protection Agency, investigators said in a report obtained by The Associated Press.
The Interior Department's inspector general found that Assistant Interior Secretary Douglas Domenech reached out to a senior EPA official in person and later by email in 2017 to advocate for the son-in-law when he was seeking a job at the agency.
Investigators said Domenech also appeared to misuse his position to promote a second family member's wedding-related business to the same EPA official, who was engaged at the time.
The AP obtained the report detailing the investigation in advance of its public release.
"The evidence indicates Domenech intended to use his position and title to induce the EPA to act," inspector general Mark Lee Greenblatt's office said in the report.
No criminal violations were found, according to Greenblatt's office. Breaking the law at issue becomes a criminal matter if it benefits the violator directly or the person's wife, child or business -- but not if it involves an in-law, according to the federal code.
Domenech was required to undergo additional ethics training as a result of the investigations into his conduct, Interior Department spokesman Nicholas Goodwin said. No further disciplinary action was taken and the matter is considered resolved, he said.
It's the second finding of ethical violations in six months against Domenech, the agency's assistant secretary for insular and international affairs. Investigators in December found that he broke federal ethics rules by twice meeting with his former employer, a conservative Texas policy group, to discuss legal disputes between the group and the agency in early 2017.
The contacts between Domenech and the EPA official began at a concert at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts in Virginia in the fall of 2017.
Domenech, three family members including the son-in-law and the senior EPA official had received free tickets through the office of then-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, the report said.
The son-in-law was not named or otherwise identified in the report, but two people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to disclose details publicly identified his relation to Domenech. One of those who spoke anonymously identified the son-in-law as Eric Frandy.
Frandy married Domenech's daughter, Emily, a Republican staff member on Capitol Hill, in 2012, according to the couple's online wedding registry. The report referred to him as "family member 1."
While at the Wolf Trap concert, Domenech was seated with the EPA official and "used his position to gain access to the EPA senior official when he believed family member 1 could not," the report said.
Domenech followed up with several emails to the EPA official, including one in which he provided Frandy's name and his experience and repeated that his son-in-law was seeking a job at the agency, the report said.
"Let me know if we can ever be of service," Domenech said in closing the message, according to the report.
He later told investigators that the email was a "courtesy" intended to move the process along.
"When asked if moving the process along was a way to influence the EPA hiring process, Domenech said, 'Well, when I think of influencing ... I guess you're right. I was trying to influence the process to move along. That's different than influencing the process to hire,'" the report said.
A Section on 05/30/2020