Congressional Republicans intensified probes into the Biden administration over its energy and climate policies by demanding Monday that top officials disclose more information about potential ethics violations and impacts on the U.S. economy.
The House Natural Resources Committee asked Interior Secretary Deb Haaland to turn over any documents and communications with family members related to her duties that, Republicans say, could present conflicts of interest or run afoul of ethics rules.
The House Oversight Committee and the Senate Banking Committee’s GOP minority are seeking responses from Treasury Secretary Janey Yellen and Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler about whether the agencies coordinated with European authorities regarding climate-change policies that Republicans say could negatively impact the economy.
The investigations mark the latest GOP efforts to investigate the administration’s handling of climate and energy policies that have been a dominant focus of critics amid surging utility and gasoline prices. The committees’ requests lay the groundwork for potential subpoenas and legal battles, should administration officials refuse to cooperate.
The Natural Resources panel wants documents from Ms. Haaland by June 26 related to communications she may have had with her daughter, Somah Haaland, about her anti-oil-drilling activism with Pueblo Action Alliance, a New Mexico environmental group that Ms. Haaland was previously involved with.
Pueblo Action Alliance lobbied against new mineral mining and drilling for oil and gas on land around New Mexico’s Chaco Culture National Historical Park which was opposed by tribal communities. Ms. Haaland last week ordered that public lands owned by the federal government within a 10-mile radius of the park be off-limits to new drilling for the next 20 years.
The committee is also seeking any correspondence between Ms. Haaland and her husband, Skip Sayre, about work-related matters.
A financial disclosure form shows Mr. Sayre is tied to the tribal group Pueblo of Laguna which receives federal funding and services from the Bureau of Indian Affairs within the Interior Department. Mr. Sayre consults for the Laguna Development Corporation, which is the business arm of the Pueblo of Laguna.
“These alliances raise ethical concerns about Secretary Haaland’s conflict of interest over specific activities like her recent decision to further restrict domestic oil and natural gas production at a site in New Mexico,” House Natural Resources Chairman Bruce Westerman, Arkansas Republican, said in a statement to The Washington Times. “The committee is calling on Secretary Haaland to shed light on these ties between her family and this extremist group so we can determine the potentially unethical way these types of decisions are being made throughout the federal bureaucracy.”
The Interior Department declined to comment.
Ms. Haaland was already facing ethics questions and is in the midst of a legal battle to shield communications with her family. She skirted questions before the same committee in April about an unfulfilled public records request from the right-leaning watchdog Protect the Public’s Trust for documents related to her daughter’s activism and lobbying efforts. The group is suing the Interior Department and the Bureau of Land Management for records.
“We get thousands and thousands of FOIA requests, so I recognize that they all can’t be attended to immediately,” Ms. Haaland testified at the time. “But they will get to those FOIA requests in a timely manner.”
Meanwhile, the House Oversight Committee and Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee want information by June 19 about proposed climate financial disclosure rules for companies that GOP lawmakers say “seek to ingrain ESG and climate-related factors throughout the financial sector.”
House Oversight Chairman James Comer, Kentucky Republican, and the Senate Banking Committee’s top Republican, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, questioned whether the U.S. agencies were trying to take after the European Union and promote so-called ESG investing that takes into consideration climate change and social justice politics.
“As U.S. policymakers, we are concerned that, under the Biden administration, the SEC and other federal agencies have been coordinating with, or ceding regulatory responsibility to, foreign regulators on these and other climate measures that will force burdensome and non-material reporting obligations on American companies,” the Republicans said.
A spokesperson for the SEC declined to respond other than to say Mr. Gensler would handle the matter privately with lawmakers.
“Chair Gensler will respond to members of Congress directly, rather than through the media,” the spokesperson told The Times.
The Treasury Department did not respond to a request for comment.
• Ramsey Touchberry can be reached at rtouchberry@washingtontimes.com.
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