Told Ya So: Investigation Confirms Watchdog’s Complaint Against Biden-Harris’s Climate Lead

EPA’s Goffman won’t pay a price, though…again

Joseph Goffman gets a lot of chances. After all, the Administrator of Air and Radiation for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was “one of the chief architects” of Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan. The same one that was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court as a massive government overreach. That doesn’t seem to be the only area in which his efforts have run afoul of higher authorities. A new report on an EPA Inspector General investigation of Mr. Goffman finds that he “failed” when it came to his ethical obligations, including on an issue raised in a complaint filed by Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT) last March.

In fact, that was the third complaint PPT filed against Mr. Goffman, the point man on the Biden-Harris climate agenda. Despite being an Obama-Biden administration alum, he can’t seem to avoid flying too close to the sun when it comes to ethics rules. (The first two complaints involved possibly improper interactions with Harvard University, his former employer, the first of which related to an admitted violation that resulted in an ethics official working to “unring the bell” of his violation.) However, unlike the mythical Icarus, Mr. Goffman always seems to escape severe consequences.

The new IG report, investigating four separate “matters that involved potential ethics violations” by Mr. Goffman, goes a long way in confirming PPT’s prior characterization of his tenure in the Biden-Harris EPA as “a pattern of abuse of position, rampant conflicts of interest, and a sustained appearance of impropriety.” Among other issues, the IG report focused on “Goffman’s participation in November and December 2022 in reviewing a hydrofluorocarbon, or HFC, allowance allocation request by [redacted], pursuant to the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act.” This was a subject of PPT’s third complaint about Mr. Goffman; he owned stock in companies seeking HFC allowances from his office. As PPT’s complaint stated: “there can be little doubt that the allocation of a limited and decreasing number of HFC allowances from within Mr. Goffman’s office was of considerable value to a company such that these allowances certainly could have a direct and predictable effect on the stock price of the company and redound to the benefit of Mr. Goffman’s financial interests.”

The IG’s report found “by a preponderance of the evidence”:

[In this and three other matters] Goffman failed to assess whether specific parties or industries that were involved posed a potential financial conflict-of-interest. As a result, he did not refer them for a financial conflicts-of-interest screen and recuse himself from the matters pending the determination of that screen.

The report also noted Mr. Goffman “failed to meet his ethical obligations under the federal financial conflicts-of-interest prohibition” by participating in certain rulemakings. The IG referred several matters to the civil division of the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, where “they were initially accepted for investigation but later declined.” The office didn’t make a criminal referral and, for his part, “Mr. Goffman disagreed with [the IG’s] conclusions and asserted that he committed no violation of any kind.”

The report vindicates PPT’s assertion that, when it comes to EPA’s Administrator of Air and Radiation, where there was smoke, there was fire. It also provides further evidence of shortcomings in the EPA’s ethics office, noting ethics officials “erroneously advised Goffman that he could participate” in a particular rulemaking the IG investigated. Once again, however, Joe Goffman flies free without any penalty being imposed by authorities.

“The Inspector General’s report clearly shows that Joe Goffman leads a charmed life,” said PPT Director Michael Chamberlain. “Few people have so many run-ins with ethics rules without paying some kind of price. Even after he admitted violating his recusal statement and got a free pass from ethics officials, he played fast and loose with his ethical obligations. The DOJ’s lack of interest despite the IG’s findings perfectly illustrates the Biden-Harris administration’s abusive relationship with the public’s trust whenever it conflicts with its agenda.”

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