Energy photographer leaks photo of Rick Perry hugging a coal executive, then loses his job,
As a photographer for the U.S. Department of Energy, Simon Edelman regularly attended meetings with Secretary Rick Perry and snapped pictures for official purposes.
Now he is out of a job and seeking whistleblower protections after leaking photographs of Perry meeting with a major energy industry donor to President Donald Trump.
Late last year, Edelman said, he shared with journalists photos he shot at the private meeting between Perry and the campaign contributor, Robert E. Murray, the head of one of the country’s largest coal mining companies, Murray Energy.
One photo showed the two men embracing; another captured the cover sheet of a confidential “action plan” that Murray brought to the meeting last March calling for policy and regulatory changes friendly to the coal industry.
Democrats and some environmental groups seized on the photos as evidence of the energy industry’s direct line to Perry, who had been in the job less than a month when the meeting occurred.
Edelman, who has not previously disclosed his identity as the source of the photographs, said in an interview that he wanted to expose the close relationship between the two men. Based on the “action plan” and conversations he overheard, Edelman said, Perry had tilted the administration’s energy policy to favor Murray Energy and other coal companies.
“It seemed like that was the right thing to do — exercising my First Amendment rights to get the information out there,” said Edelman, who had worked at the agency since 2015 and whose job included photographing events that the agency promoted in press releases, on the web and elsewhere.
The day after the photos were published by In These Times, a liberal magazine, the Energy Department put Edelman on administrative leave, seized his personal laptop and escorted him out of its headquarters in Washington, he said. He was later told, without explanation, that his employment agreement had not been renewed, internal agency emails show.
Edelman has now filed a complaint with the Energy Department’s inspector general and, according to his lawyer, is seeking protections provided to federal whistleblowers. On its website, the Energy Department notes that it is illegal to retaliate against whistleblowers, who are typically protected when they alert a supervisor or the inspector general to information that they reasonably believe to constitute an abuse of authority, or other misconduct.
In the complaint, Edelman accuses the agency of retaliation and asks for his job back or at least to recover his laptop and other personal belongings. In addition, Edelman accused a former colleague of encouraging him to delete the photos of Perry and Murray, which Edelman and his lawyer argue are public records.
The Energy Department declined to discuss the circumstances surrounding Edelman’s employment, the status of the photos, or the details of his complaint, but a spokeswoman characterized his accusations as “ridiculous.”
“They are based on his own subjective opinions and personal agenda,” the spokeswoman, Shaylyn Hynes, said in an email. “Industry and other stakeholders visit the Department of Energy on a daily basis. The secretary welcomes their input and feedback to strengthen the American energy sector. This meeting was no different.”
A spokesman for Murray said the coal executive “does not have a recollection as to the exact statements allegedly made nearly a year ago.” The spokesman, Gary Broadbent, added that “Mr. Murray has frequently said that the Trump administration must advance reliable and low-cost electricity for all Americans and protect coal mining jobs.”
The confidential documents Murray brought to his meeting with Perry called for “rescinding anti-coal regulations of the Obama administration” and cutting the staff of the Environmental Protection Agency “in at least half,” according to portions visible in Edelman’s photographs.