Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Ms. HIRONO. Mr. President, over the past 2\1/2\ years, we have seen a remarkable pattern emerge in the types of people Donald Trump nominates to serve in his administration. His nominees have extensive conflicts of interest. They work to advance the interest of foreign clients, financial patrons, or other special interests. In doing so, they are actively hostile to the very departments in which they have been nominated to serve.

Daniel Jorjani--the President's nominee to serve as Solicitor of the Department of the Interior--is a classic example of this pattern. The DOI Solicitor is a critically important position in the Department. In addition to being the chief legal adviser to the Secretary, the Solicitor is intimately involved in developing the legal justifications for Department policies, defending DOI positions in court, and overseeing compliance with the Freedom of Information Act, FOIA.

Given the influence the Department's Solicitor has on issues, such as the implementation of the Endangered Species Act, stewardship of public lands, and holding companies accountable for their impacts on the environment, it is essential that whoever occupies this job can execute his or her duties in a manner that upholds the public trust.

With the nomination of Daniel Jorjani, Donald Trump has once again shown that he prioritizes exploiting our environment for the benefit of fossil fuel companies over the very real interests of the American people and protecting our environment.

Prior to joining the Trump administration, Mr. Jorjani spent 7 years working in organizations throughout the Koch brothers' sprawling empire. In positions such as the general counsel of Freedom Partners, Mr. Jorjani assisted the Koch brothers in pursuing a relentlessly pro- fossil fuel agenda. He fought against the Obama administration's actions to combat climate change and protect the environment.

It was with precisely this experience in mind that Donald Trump appointed Mr. Jorjani as the Principal Deputy Solicitor and Acting Solicitor of DOI in 2017. During his tenure in these roles, which did not require Senate confirmation, Mr. Jorjani wasted little time before mounting a full frontal assault on Obama-era environmental regulations, to the delight of his former patrons. Of the eight Solicitor's legal opinions that Mr. Jorjani authored, seven roll back Obama-era environmental regulations.

Let me focus on one example that certainly sticks out. In a stunning reversal of a 2017 opinion issued by then-Solicitor Hilary Tompkins, Mr. Jorjani pushed to shield companies from liability for killing birds protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act as long as it was not the company's intended action.

That is like saying BP shouldn't have to pay to clean up the Deepwater Horizon oilspill because they didn't intend to release nearly 5 million barrels--200 million gallons--of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Clearly, companies should not be shielded from their negligence.

Mr. Jorjani's reversal of the opinion overturned existing Department enforcement practices that had been in place for the past 40 years. The oil and gas industry had been complaining about this rule for years precisely because it held them accountable for their actions.

When I asked Mr. Jorjani directly at his confirmation hearing about which industry benefited most from this reversal decision of his, he claimed: ``I'm not aware of any particular industry that benefits from this.''

Who is he trying to kid? My reaction to Mr. Jorjani's shibai--or BS-- answer is that the oil and gas industries are the biggest beneficiaries. He knew it, and I knew it.

Mr. Jorjani's actions are particularly alarming in light of a new study that found that North America has lost 3 billion birds--nearly 30 percent of our total bird population--in the past 50 years.

In normal times, we expect leaders of the Interior Department to pursue policies to mitigate the harm being done to our ecosystems and environment, not to do things that will actually make big problems even worse. But these are not normal times.

Instead, we have yet another Trump nominee with extensive conflicts of interest, pursuing policies that help his former employers in a manner that is fundamentally hostile to the Department in which he or she serves.

Fitting the Trump administration's normal pattern of corruption should be more than enough to deny him confirmation to this critical job, but Mr. Jorjani--just like his boss, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt--is also currently under investigation by the DOI inspector general.

Mr. Jorjani is under investigation for potential misconduct related to his management of the Department's compliance with the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, and its so-called supplemental review policy.

Under this policy, political appointees at the Department are notified about the public release of any documents containing their names or email addresses. This policy can be problematic even in normal times. It could result in political interference in the FOIA process to delay the release of potentially damaging information, but DOI allegedly has an additional internal review policy that goes even further. It allows Mr. Jorjani and the Department's Deputy Chief of Staff 5 days before release to review requested records that involve senior staff in the Secretary's office. This review process not only opens up the possibility for inappropriate delays but also allows for willful and blatant withholding of important information the public has requested.

In response to questions at his confirmation hearing and questions for the record, Mr. Jorjani asserted that he ``typically did not review records prior to their release under the FOIA.'' However, internal documents released by the DOI paint a very different picture, one in which Mr. Jorjani was regularly involved in reviewing FOIA documents.

At best, Mr. Jorjani was not forthcoming or candid. In fact, it appeared that he lied under oath.

With a position as important as this one, the American people deserve, at the very least, an ethical Solicitor devoted to the mission of the Department, one who is not compromised by or catering to the narrow interests of his former employers or one who doesn't tell his staff, as Mr. Jorjani told his staff, that ``at the end of the day our job is to protect the Secretary.'' Protecting the Secretary is nowhere in Mr. Jorjani's job description. He is yet another Trump nominee who should not be confirmed by the Senate.

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