Dems Distort Ethics Guidance To Assassinate Character Of Trump Appointee
- October 21, 2025
Catherine Gripp, The Federalist
Several Democrats on the House Committee on Natural Resources mischaracterized ethics guidelines in a letter to Acting Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Interior Caryl Brzymialkiewicz, pushing for an investigation into Trump appointee Matthew Giacona, government accountability watchdog Protect the Public’s Trust told The Federalist. Giacona is Acting Director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), housed under the Department of Interior (DOI).
“The minority members’ letter gets facts wrong, misreads relevant laws, and demonstrates a complete ignorance of past decisions by the OIG,” Michael Chamberlain, Director of Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT) told The Federalist.
The letter alleges ethics violations involving a supposed conflict of interest between Giacona’s lobbying efforts on behalf of National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) before joining BOEM, and his related work there.
The Democrat’s letter reveals their motives at least in part, claiming that the alleged ethics violations “are especially troubling in the midst of the Trump Administration’s ongoing attack
on energy security,” and that the supposed conflict of interest with Giacona’s former positions “appear to be central to this agenda.” Perhaps the Democrats’ concern is not over Giacona’s ethics but his position to advance the Trump Administration’s energy objectives.
However, a letter sent Monday to the Office of the DOI Inspector General (OIG) from Protect the Public’s Trust argued that the connections between Giacona’s previous positions and his work with BOEM are not the incrimination the Democrats make it out to be. PPT’s letter said it hopes to keep “the U.S. taxpayer from incurring needless expense to investigate partisan motivated, uninformed character attacks.”
PPT’s letter implies that the authors are either inept at interpreting the ethics guidelines to which they refer or “intentionally seek to misdirect the OIG into a baseless partisan investigation.”