Only 2 percent of $151k spent on personal travel

Former Trump FEMA chief repaid taxpayers only 2 percent of $151k spent on personal travel

By DANIEL LIPPMAN and IAN KULLGREN

Former FEMA Administrator Brock Long returned to the government only a tiny fraction of the costs he incurred for unauthorized use of vehicles while in office, according to previously undisclosed documents provided to POLITICO.

A Homeland Security Department inspector general probe last year found that Long spent $151,000 using government-funded Chevrolet Suburbans for routine weekend travel to his home in North Carolina. After POLITICO broke the story of the investigation in September, Long was forced to reimburse the expenses, which he agreed to do.

But a copy of Long’s personal check, obtained by the watchdog group American Oversight through a public records request, shows that the former administrator paid back only $2,716 — less than 2 percent of the total cost billed to taxpayers.

That’s because then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, who oversaw FEMA, did not require Long to reimburse the government fully for his misuse of an expensive program.

Nielsen told Long in a Jan. 15 letter that the DHS chief financial officer “determined that the reimbursement amount calculated by the [Office of Inspector General] is in excess of the cost of providing personal transportation services, and would have required you to reimburse costs of the program execution unrelated to any personal benefit gained.”

The $2,716 bill, Nielsen wrote, was calculated based on a rate of 81.7 cents per mile for 3,324 unauthorized miles driven.

“Your leadership is widely respected within the Department, and I appreciate you taking full responsibility for this matter and ensuring that it will not recur,” Nielsen added. Brock resigned the following month.

In addition to the government vehicles probe, Long’s tenure at FEMA drew sharp criticism for his response to the devastation in Puerto Rico by Hurricane Maria in 2017. The agency was faulted for vastly under-counting the number of deaths and for responding much less forcefully than it did to Hurricane Harvey, a milder storm that flooded parts of coastal Texas — a state that delivered 38 electoral votes to President Donald Trump in 2016.

"Between Puerto Rico, Texas, and the California wildfires, you don't have to look very far to find better ways FEMA could have spent $150,000,” Austin Evers, executive director of American Oversight, said in a statement to POLITICO. “As we saw with Scott Pruitt and Tom Price before, too many Trump appointees seem to view public service as a source of luxury perks, and once again the taxpayers have been left holding the bag."

A DHS spokesperson defended the decision, telling POLITICO in a written statement that the ethics report “included both the cost of former Administrator Long’s personal use of a government vehicle and the costs of a FEMA program to ensure that the former Administrator would be able to maintain communications with senior administration and Department officials in the event of an emergency such as an unexpected natural disaster … The department decided that Mr. Long would repay the costs-per-mile for all instances in which he was transported in a government vehicle while not on official business.”

The DHS inspector general, which conducted the ethics probe, concluded that Long’s unauthorized use of vehicles cost the government $94,000 in salary payments, $55,000 in travel expenses and $2,000 in vehicle costs. Government drivers frequently shuttled Long between family home in Hickory, N.C. and Charlotte Douglas International Airport, where he would fly to and from Washington.

On several occasions, drivers made the seven-hour trip directly to Hickory from Washington, the report said. Typically they were given overtime pay “despite spending the weekend in a hotel room.”

On another occasion, Long used government vehicles to transport his family from his home to the Charlotte airport, roughly an hour-long drive, for a trip to Hawaii. Although part of the trip was for official business, Long also used government drivers to ferry his family around the island, including to a Dole plantation and a volcano. (Long later gave the government a $309 check after staff questioned him about the expense.)

The IG’s findings didn’t make sense to some officials inside DHS, who argued that Long — even if he had driven his own car — would have required support staff and round-the-clock access to FEMA’s advanced communications system to coordinate an emergency response during a catastrophic event and to reach key officials, including Trump, said one administration official with knowledge of the matter. The official, who spoke with POLITICO on the condition of anonymity, also said that the IG’s report lacked nuance, and that the figures weren’t as egregious as the report portrayed.

A spokesperson for the DHS inspector general said in a statement that the office does not comment on corrective actions from investigations. But, the spokesperson said, “We stand behind the findings.”

Nielsen did not respond to a request for comment. Long declined to comment, but directed POLITICO to a letter he sent to Nielsen in January, in which he agreed to pay the bill without admitting liability. In the letter, Long said his use of the communications program followed the instruction of advisers.

“I believe this program operated for me the same way it operated for the previous FEMA Administrator, and various deputies, since the program's inception in 2008,” he wrote.

Long, in an interview with investigators, said the use of federal vehicles was necessary, describing his role in coordinating government disaster response as “Top Secret.” Pressed by investigators, Long “admitted there was no specific policy that required the vehicles to support him to fulfill [his] requirements,” the IG noted.