It’s not unusual for Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin to be on the road touting the Trump administration’s agenda, but his travel itinerary in the weeks before the midterm election looks like a trail of political hot spots.
On Thursday, Zeldin traveled to an auto repair shop and a construction firm in central Pennsylvania with Rep. Scott Perry, one of the most endangered Republicans in Congress. Earlier in the week, Zeldin was in Iowa with Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson, who is in a neck-and-neck race for the state’s open Senate seat. Zeldin later headed to a family farm in Wisconsin with Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden, who is fighting to keep his seat representing the state’s 3rd Congressional District.
Zeldin’s slew of stops with candidates—all promoted with press releases from EPA headquarters—generates concern, in the view of the political watchdog group that is taking on a $20 million taxpayer-funded advertising campaign praising Trump and his administration.
“It does raise questions on whether the EPA administrator is engaged in political activity in a way that violates the Hatch Act,” said Kedric Payne, senior director of ethics for the Campaign Legal Center, referring to the 87-year-old law that limits the political activities of federal employees. Although cabinet officials like Zeldin get more leeway under that law than most civil servants to attend campaign events and the like, they are not permitted to use taxpayer resources to do so.
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