A top-ranking official overseeing the Fish and Wildlife Service at the Interior Department may have leaked internal agency documents to industry lobbyists by email, if a charge printed in the blog Coeruleus is true. This could be yet another governmental official to be "caught by email." According to Coeruleus:
"The inspector general also found that Ms. MacDonald (Julie A. MacDonald, the deputy assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks) had sent internal government documents by e-mail to a lawyer for the Pacific Legal Foundation — a property-rights group that frequently challenges endangered-species decisions.
"She twice sent internal Environmental Protection Agency documents — one involving water quality management — to individuals whose e-mail addresses ended in 'chevrontexaco.com,' the report said."
The Washington Post, in an unrelated article, describes Ms. McDonald as saying "she sees her job as protecting "the public face of the Fish and Wildlife Service" by carefully scrutinizing listing documents that often seem vague or unsupported by evidence."
"A lot of times when I first read a document I think, 'This is a joke, this is just not right.' So I'll ask questions," said MacDonald, a civil engineer by training who worked at the California Resources Agency before joining the Interior Department in 2002. "These documents have tremendous economic and social implications for people."
If you search Google for "Julie MacDonald and email". you will find that she is quite a controversial figure in the environmental movement. So, rather than believing one blog, we should wait to see what (if any) emails are released. I do not know if leaking of internal documents is a crime. But, I am guessing that being "caught by email" could cause problems for MacDonald. Certainly, the groups that don't care for MacDonald will let us know more. And, I expect this will create even more desire to investigate emails.
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