This is My Shocked Face

Former Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke has been cited as having broken ethics rules by the Inspector General.

Short version:  He may have sold real estate to some folks who then got special access and favors.

Likely, he got a better than expected price too.

Nothing to see here, move along:

Facing serious allegations about his ethics and conduct in office, Ryan Zinke, then secretary of Donald Trump’s Interior Department, told a government official in 2018 that he had done nothing improper. Negotiations over a land deal in his hometown of Whitefish, Mont., were proceeding without him. His involvement was minimal, he said; his meeting with the project’s developers at Interior headquarters was “purely social.”

But a report released Wednesday by the department’s internal watchdog caught Zinke in a lie. Email and text message exchanges show he communicated with the developers 64 times between August 2017 and July 2018 to discuss the project’s design, the use of his foundation’s land as a parking lot, and his interest in operating a brewery on the site.

“These communications, examples of which are set forth below, show that Secretary Zinke played an extensive, direct, and substantive role in representing the Foundation during negotiations with the 95 Karrow project developers,” Inspector General Mark Greenblatt’s office wrote.

Zinke “was not simply a passthrough for information,” the report said. “He personally acted for or represented the Foundation in connection with the negotiations.”

The report found that Zinke broke federal ethics rules repeatedly by improperly participating in real estate negotiations with the then-chairman of the energy giant Halliburton and other developers.

………

Now a leading Republican candidate for a newly drawn congressional seat in Montana this fall, Zinke also misused his official position, the report concluded. Investigators found that he had directed some of his staff to set up a meeting with the developers and print documents related to the project. Federal officials are generally prohibited from assigning their employees tasks related to their private business.

Zinke, 60, a former Navy SEAL who rode to work on horseback on his first day at Interior, served one term in the House of Representatives before he joined Trump’s Cabinet. A major proponent of oil and gas drilling and coal mining, Zinke resigned under pressure less than two years later under an avalanche of investigations into his conduct.

What I find interesting here is just how often former Navy SEALS are involved in something deeply corrupt.

You have Zinke, Eric Prince (Blackwater), Eric Greitens (alleged blackmail and rape), Dan Crenshaw (alleged insider trading), Scott Taylor (multiple staffers indicted related to electoral petition fraud), etc.

It seems that there may be a problem within the culture of the SEALS.

In any case, the Trump appointed inspector general just said that Zinke is dirty.