Most of us have had the experience of realizing that we had scheduled meetings or appointments without leaving enough time to cover the physical distance between them and get from appointment A to appointment B on time. When that happens, we usually do a little thing called rescheduling. Not Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke. His answer is to get the government to provide a helicopter for him.
To be sure, Zinke is a Very Important Person and terrible things might happen if he rescheduled. Let’s check it out:
In a case detailed in the new documents, Zinke ordered a U.S. Park Police helicopter to take him and his chief of staff, Scott Hommel, to an emergency management exercise in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, on June 21.
Okay, an emergency management exercise. Sounds important. We can wonder how essential Zinke’s presence there was, if maybe it wasn’t a touch symbolic, but let’s accept that he needed to be there. So why couldn’t he leave in time to drive there?
Zinke’s staff justified the $8,000 flight by saying official business would prevent him leaving Washington before 2 p.m., too late to make the two-hour drive to the exercise, according to the documents.
The event that prevented Zinke from leaving before 2 p.m. was the swearing-in ceremony for Rep. Greg Gianforte (R-Mont.), according to Zinke's official Interior calendar. Gianforte, who won a special election for Zinke's old seat in May, and his wife contributed $15,800 to Zinke’s two congressional campaigns.
Hmmm. I’m sure it’s nice to see your successor sworn in, especially when he’s a former campaign donor, but is it an $8,000 helicopter ride worth of necessary?
On another occasion:
Zinke also ordered a Park Police helicopter to fly him and another Interior official to and from Yorktown, Virginia, on July 7 in order to be back in Washington in time for a 4 p.m. horseback ride with Pence. The trip cost about $6,250, according to the documents.
While in Yorktown, Zinke completed a walking tour of the local Revolutionary War battlefield and attended a boating industry roundtable discussion, according to the documents.
He got a helicopter ride so he wouldn’t have to miss his horseback ride with Mike Pence. No doubt they discussed many things of importance, but … hmmm. Yeah. Interesting travel choices for someone already—less than a year into his role—being investigated for how often his official travel coincides with political events. But for a member of Donald Trump’s cabinet, taking unnecessary private flights at taxpayer expense is just one of the perks of the job.