Scott Pruitt now has a Chick-fil-A scandal
First-class flyer, luxury pen aficionado, and energy lobby tenant Scott Pruitt is now embroiled in yet another scandal — this time involving fast food chain Chick-fil-A.
The Environmental Protection Agency administrator instructed his staffers to reach out to Chick-fil-A's chairman and president in the hopes of securing his wife a job, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.
Pruitt reportedly framed his outreach as "a potential business opportunity," only later revealing that he was actually working on behalf of his wife Marlyn, who was interested in opening a location of the fast food franchise. The deal never came to fruition, reports the Post, but government ethics experts say that the efforts alone constitute a questionable use of government time and resources.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Pruitt's executive scheduler emailed Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy in May 2017, after Pruitt had reportedly expressed to staffers that he wanted his wife to start earning a salary. Pruitt also reached out to Concordia, a nonprofit social impact organization, eventually securing Marlyn a short-term job organizing the group's annual conference.
The EPA chief is under federal investigation for a dozen different scandals, ranging from his decision to install a $43,000 soundproof phone booth in his office to his wild spending on "safety measures." Read more at The Washington Post.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Summer Meza has worked at The Week since 2018, serving as a staff writer, a news writer and currently the deputy editor. As a proud news generalist, she edits everything from political punditry and science news to personal finance advice and film reviews. Summer has previously written for Newsweek and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, covering national politics, transportation and the cannabis industry.
-
World’s oldest rock art discovered in IndonesiaUnder the Radar Ancient handprint on Sulawesi cave wall suggests complexity of thought, challenging long-held belief that human intelligence erupted in Europe
-
Claude Code: the viral AI coding app making a splash in techThe Explainer Engineers and noncoders alike are helping the app go viral
-
‘Human trafficking isn’t something that happens “somewhere else”’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
TikTok secures deal to remain in USSpeed Read ByteDance will form a US version of the popular video-sharing platform
-
Unemployment rate ticks up amid fall job lossesSpeed Read Data released by the Commerce Department indicates ‘one of the weakest American labor markets in years’
-
US mints final penny after 232-year runSpeed Read Production of the one-cent coin has ended
-
Warner Bros. explores sale amid Paramount bidsSpeed Read The media giant, home to HBO and DC Studios, has received interest from multiple buying parties
-
Gold tops $4K per ounce, signaling financial uneaseSpeed Read Investors are worried about President Donald Trump’s trade war
-
Electronic Arts to go private in record $55B dealspeed read The video game giant is behind ‘The Sims’ and ‘Madden NFL’
-
New York court tosses Trump's $500M fraud fineSpeed Read A divided appeals court threw out a hefty penalty against President Trump for fraudulently inflating his wealth
-
Trump said to seek government stake in IntelSpeed Read The president and Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan reportedly discussed the proposal at a recent meeting
