Senior Interior Official Put Politics Ahead of Science

A high-ranking Interior Department official "rode roughshod" over scientists at the Fish and Wildlife Service, monkeyed with the classification of endangered species and sent internal agency documents to contacts at ChevronTexaco (now just Chevron), according to a story in The New York Times today about a new report by the Interior Department's Inspector General.

The report, an investigation into allegations of fishy behavior by Julie MacDonald, then the deputy assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks, determined that MacDonald violated federal rules and bypassed agency scientists in favor of advocating for industry viewpoints.

Here's more from the NYT story:

"75 percent of the Western offices' findings on endangered-species status reviews and critical-habitat determinations were sent to Washington without any assurance from career lawyers and biologists that they were valid....Ms. MacDonald lobbied for a decision to combine three different populations of the California tiger salamander into one, thus excluding it from the endangered-species list, and making the decision legally vulnerable. A federal district judge overturned it in 2005., saying the decision was made 'without even a semblance of agency reasoning.'"

Fish and Wildlife has been in the news several times this past month. First, there was the revelation of an internal memo seeking to control how government scientists in Alaska discuss climate change, polar bears and thinning sea ice. Then, two days ago, Salon unearthed a secret 117-page draft proposal to scuttle the Endangered Species Act.

But evidence of the disregard (.pdf) for endangered species and accepted science by appointees within the agency has never been secret. It's right there on the public record. MacDonald testified often in front of Congress. Here's a statement of hers from 2003, when she argued that the military should be granted exemptions from the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.