Scott Pruitt Latest Administration Official To Have Business Flights Challenged

Several fights for official government business by EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt are being scrutinized, the latest administration official to have flights come under review.

CBS News reports that Pruitt flew on a Department of the Interior Learjet from Tulsa to Guymon in his home state of Oklahoma for a town hall meeting with farmers on water issues. The EPA said the flight as booked through DOI using an inter-agency program because the travel time by car between the two cities was five hours and no commercial flight was available.

In June, Pruitt flew from Cincinnati to New York's JFK airport aboard a military plane before boarding a commercial flight to Italy for a G7 environmental summit. The EPA said that the military flight was necessary to make the proper connections for meetings at the Vatican prior to the summit, according to CNN.

The third flight was between Denver and Durango, CO for a scheduled visit to the Gold King Mine. A private plane was chartered when the commercial flight he was supposed to be on was delayed by more than five hours. "It would have been impossible to make it to the important Gold King Mine visit with a bipartisan group of elected officials waiting for the administrator," an EPA spokesman told CNN. "Due to the short amount of time we had to make a decision and while the governor's office was working on logistics, we were able to find a charter plane which was cleared by the EPA's ethics counsel."

In all cases, the EPA said that the agency's ethics office cleared the flights.  

Flights by Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin have also been called into question. President Trump said publicly he was "unhappy" with such actions by Secretary Price.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos also uses her personal private plane for official travel, but does not bill the government for its use.

FMI: CBS