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SWAMP ALERT: Acting FAA Chief Coordinated With Lobbyist Buddies on Safety Policy
Another Swamp Alert for you all. This is becoming an unintentional series for Smart Dissent. There's just so many it's impossible to keep up but we try to share a few so here you go. Repeat after us: Regulations Protect Us.
As he moved through the FAA's ranks, the now-acting FAA chief Dan Elwell exchanged emails with lobbyists and other industry players discussing everything from reversing consumer protections to airport privatization.
Elwell was named the FAA’s deputy administrator in June 2017. A month later, one of his former lobbyist colleagues emailed asking him to “weigh in directly” on compliance issues contained in the FAA’s five-year funding bill. Elwell wrote back that he would be “Happy to do it,” and he asked a subordinate to help “set it up.”
....his wide-ranging email discussions with industry players included a push by lobbyists to intervene in government research.
The emails offer a detailed picture of the tight connections between the airline industry and the government, while the FAA is facing increased scrutiny over its oversight after two crashes of the Boeing’s 737 Max.
Elwell is a former lobbyist. Now he runs the agency. He's taking orders from his lobbyist buddies. THAT IS THE SWAMP.
Political appointees typically aren’t allowed to participate in issues that involve their former employer or clients they have worked for.... But the rules did not apply to Elwell during his first few months at the FAA when he worked on the deregulatory team. He had been classified as a kind of government consultant — a “special-government employee” — who isn’t bound by the ethics rules.
Elwell’s designation as a special-government employee also allowed him to continue his private consulting business even as he worked for the government.
Elwell continued strategizing with his former lobbyist colleagues even after he was no longer a special-government employee and rose up to the top ranks of the agency.