Ron Wyden: “Last week, the inspector general at the Department of Interior made an extraordinary statement about the lack of ethics…”

“Last week, the inspector general at the Department of Interior made an extraordinary statement about the lack of ethics, in his view, at the Department of Interior. I have come to the Chamber this afternoon to discuss that and to bring to the Senate's attention some new developments on this issue. What the Interior Department's inspector general, Mr. Earl Devaney, said last week is essentially that the Department has lost its ethical compass, and specifically the inspector general stated: Simply stated, short of a crime, anything goes at the highest levels of the Department of Interior. Mr. Devaney pointed to a number of instances where he thought the Department was essentially defending the indefensible and was particularly troubled by the way the Department's royalty efforts--the efforts to collect money owed to the Federal Government--were going forward. This morning, there are new developments on this issue which are particularly relevant to the Senate's work for the rest of the session.”