ABC News(WASHINGTON) — The lobbyist connected to a controversial living arrangement for Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt emailed the agency on behalf of a client last year, seemingly contradicting his earlier assertion that he did not lobby the EPA in 2017.
For much of his first year in Washington Pruitt stayed in a room in a Capitol Hill townhouse co-owned by Vicki Hart, the wife of veteran D.C. lobbyist J. Steven Hart, paying $50 for each night he used it.
The arrangement occurred while Steven Hart and others in his law firm, Williams and Jensen, represented clients with interests in environmental policies, according to disclosure reports. Hart said he never directly lobbied Pruitt or the EPA, but the newly released email has raised questions about whether he actually did contact the EPA on behalf of his clients.
He recently stepped down from his firm amid the fallout from questions about whether the private rental arrangement violated any rules or gave the appearance of a conflict of interest.
EPA ethics officials have said that the condo deal did not violate gift rules because Pruitt paid $50-a-night to stay in a room at the townhouse, which they said is comparable to market rate. But one of those EPA ethics officials later said she and her colleagues lacked relevant details when they made that determination. And, regardless, that official said the decision only applies to whether the arrangement was an inappropriate gift, not whether it was a conflict of interest.
A spokesman for Hart previously said that he did not lobby the EPA in 2017 or 2018, but a new email obtained by ABC News shows that Hart contacted a senior EPA official to recommend nominees for one of the boards that advises the EPA on scientific questions.
In the email to EPA chief of staff Ryan Jackson, he wrote “I want to highlight these candidates for the Science Advisory Board, who were nominated by our client, Dennis Treacy, the President of the Smithfield Foundation.
The names of the nominees are redacted from the email but the EPA told the New York Times they were not appointed to the board.
EPA chief of staff Ryan Jackson released a statement Wednesday dismissing the Hart email, saying the agency regularly received hundreds of “solicited and unsolicited” suggestions for possible appointees.
“Smithfield Foods was not advocating for anyone to be on the Science Advisory Board, and Steve Hart was passing along suggestions of individuals who may be interested in serving,” Jackson said.
The email is one of a batch of documents provided to members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, many of whom questioned Pruitt in a hearing with one of its subcommittees last week.
The committee’s ranking member Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said in a statement that the email is proof Pruitt misled Congress.
“This email is further proof that Administrator Pruitt has consistently misled Congress and the public about the extent to which the special interests providing him with gifts have sought specific favors from EPA in return,” Pallone said in a statement. “This culture of corruption has diverted public funds to special interests and could undermine all of the important work the EPA does.”
Hart also met with Pruitt and Treacy in what his spokesman called a personal meeting to discuss issues related to preservation of the Chesapeake Bay.
The EPA’s internal watchdog is now looking into Pruitt’s living arrangement. The arrangement has raised questions about whether it was an illegal gift for the landlord to hold the room open for Pruitt even when he did not stay there and whether it was a conflict of interest.
EPA ethics officials have said that the arrangement was not an illegal gift because it matched other rates in the area, but they also said that their decision only evaluated whether it was a gift and not a conflict of interest. One ethics official said that she didn’t have all the information about the agreement when she made the determination.
ABC News has reached out to Smithfield and Treacy for comment.
Hart’s former law firm, Williams & Jensen, did not comment on the mail but said in a statement that the firm has engaged outside counsel to review its 2017 filings amid recent reports about Hart’s lobbying activity.
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