EXCLUSIVE: Top Interior Official Resigned Amid Claims Of Intimidating Behavior
Source: TPM
By Alice Ollstein | May 2, 2018 6:00 am
When the Director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) abruptly resigned last week after less than six months in his post, the agency gave no explanation.
But an e-mail from a BIA employee obtained by TPM claims the director, Bryan Rice, exhibited aggressive and intimidating behavior toward her in an incident she believes was captured by a surveillance camera. The woman involved and her supporters have been urging tribal leaders — via e-mail and social media — to submit Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to the Interior Department for the video of the alleged incident. At least five did so in the weeks leading up to Rice’s resignation, according to the agency’s FOIA logs.
The five identically worded FOIA queries read: “Request footage of the Indian Affairs FOIA Officer, Jessica Rogers and Bryan Rice, Bureau of Indian Affairs Director on the 4th floor north and south hallway in the main Interior building on December 6, 2017, between on or about 9 am and noon.”
On March 26 of this year, BIA FOIA officer Jessica Rogers blasted out an e-mail to Native American tribal leaders calling Rice “an insidious perpetrator of harassment” and encouraging them to submit FOIA requests for video of Rice “exerting intimidating and hostile behavior” toward Rogers.
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Read more: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/exclusive-top-interior-official-resigned-amid-claims-of-intimidating-behavior
Geez. Are there any of Trump's Cabinet without putrid swamp messes??
EDIT to Add:
Harassment pervades the Bureau of Indian Affairs
https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.6/tribal-affairs-harassment-pervades-interiors-bureau-of-indian-affairs
One of the oldest agencies in the Department of Interior appears to have some of its worst harassment problems.
Anna V. Smith Analysis March 13, 2018 From the print edition
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Sue Parton first began working for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1976, as a teacher at the Albuquerque Indian School, one of the few remaining BIA boarding schools at that time. Parton, a member of the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma, had been around the agency most of her life; her father was a lifelong employee. But she gained a new perspective in 2008, as she got more involved with the Federation of Indian Service Employees, the union that represents employees of the four Interior Department agencies that serve Native Americans.
“One of the things that shocked me was the intimidation factor,” says Parton, now president of the union. “A lot of people had complaints that they were being treated unfairly and harassed, but were intimidated — didn’t want to speak up or didn’t want their name out there for fear of retaliation. That has been in existence for a long time.”
Federal agencies have been coming under increased scrutiny for their failure to address harassment. Earlier this month, the chief of the Forest Service resigned after allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced. At the Interior Department, much of Secretary Ryan Zinke and Congress’ attention has gone to harassment claims within the National Park Service. The department, which commissioned workplace surveys for each of its agencies, released the Park Service results in October 2017, along with an immediate action plan for remediation. Since then, the other agencies’ survey results have become public, showing that harassment is not just a Park Service issue.....................................
