Cleanups of Spill and an Agency Test Salazar

From left, Ken Salazar, Steven Chu and Carol M. Browner form part of a “green dream team” appointed by President Obama. But Mr. Salazar has since faced criticism from environmentalists.

From The New York Times:

Shortly before [President Obama's televised address on Tuesday about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico], the White House announced that Mr. Salazar would be getting a powerful new deputy, Michael R. Bromwich, a veteran investigator and former prosecutor, to supervise the remaking of the minerals service. What was not mentioned was that Mr. Salazar had appointed two aides to do the same job just a month before, and that Mr. Bromwich’s new assignment essentially reversed not only that move but also perhaps Mr. Salazar’s entire overhaul plan for the minerals service.

Mr. Salazar’s job is not in immediate jeopardy, and the president values the work he has done and will continue to do at the Interior Department, said Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary.

But a senior administration official, who spoke of a delicate personnel matter only on the condition of anonymity said, “The president and the White House are watching very, very closely the pace of reform at Interior to see that progress is being made that truly cleans it up.”

Mr. Salazar is a core member of what some environmentalists called a “green dream team” of environmental advisers appointed by Mr. Obama shortly after his inauguration. Others include Steven Chu, the energy secretary; Lisa P. Jackson, the Environmental Protection Agency administrator; and Carol M. Browner, a White House adviser.

But the Deepwater Horizon disaster and its fallout appear to have shifted the roles of the team members. Mr. Salazar, who started his job billing himself as the “new sheriff in town,” has become noticeably less visible since the minerals agency’s regulatory laxity came under attack, while Dr. Chu and Ms. Browner have moved to the fore. Ms. Jackson has focused closely on issues of air and water quality relating to the spill and has remained largely out of the limelight.

In the first weeks after the oil rig exploded on April 20, Mr. Salazar was one of the administration’s chief spokesmen on the disaster. On May 2, he sat for interviews with four Sunday morning TV talk shows. For weeks, he appeared routinely at hearings on Capitol Hill, often saying of BP that “we have our boot on their neck to make sure they get the job done.”

Even former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, who described himself as a friend of Mr. Salazar, said in an interview that the administration’s response to the disaster had been slow and that its reform proposals too tepid.

“The administration took way too long getting its act together and in mounting a coordinated, aggressive response to the spill,” Mr. Babbitt said.