» Rick Perry officially resigns his post as Trump’s energy secretary.
WASHINGTON — Energy Secretary Rick Perry gave President Donald Trump his resignation Thursday, as inquiries deepen into Perry’s role in the administration’s efforts to pressure the Ukrainian government to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
Traveling with Trump aboard Air Force One for a political rally in Dallas, Perry told the president he planned to leave the department by the end of November — possibly the end of the year — said a person close to the secretary. The resignation has been planned for months, as Perry told friends he was ready to return to Texas and his home in rural Round Top.
“The opportunity to serve in your cabinet as the secretary of energy of the United States has been an extreme honor,” Perry said in a letter to Trump on Thursday. “I feel comfortable that the department is well prepared to continue this mission with new leadership at the helm.”
While touring a Louis Vuitton factory outside of Dallas, Trump praised Perry and said he already had a replacement picked, widely speculated to be Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette, a former Washington lobbyist and executive with the insurance company USAA.
“I want to thank you, Rick. What a job you’ve done,” Trump said at the Dallas rally Thursday night.
The resignation comes at the end of what had largely been a quiet 2½ years heading the Energy Department, as Perry stayed below the radar of Washington’s
press corps even as other Cabinet members fell into scandal or out of favor with the president.
After once proclaiming he would abolish the Energy Department, Perry went about championing American energy companies, working to expand markets abroad for coal and liquefied natural gas. At the same time he steadily visited the department’s national labs, proclaiming energy secretary the “coolest job” he’d ever had.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in a statement Thursday afternoon, praised Perry as “a good man and a good friend who has devoted his life to serving his country, especially the great state of Texas.” Cruz added, “I wish him the best as he returns to private life after a long, successful, and productive career.”
Perry had long planned to leave the administration before Trump’s re-election campaign got into full swing, but the Ukrainian scandal has complicated that plan.
Perry’s involvement first came to light last month when a whistleblower complaint was released detailing that Trump had sent Perry to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s inauguration in place of Vice President Mike Pence as a signal that the administration was waiting to see how the new Ukrainian president “chose to act.”
In a later phone call with Zelensky, Trump requested the new president look into whether Biden had attempted to block an investigation into his son’s work at a small Ukrainian natural gas company.
Perry denied any effort to pressure the Ukrainians regarding Biden, and so far no evidence to the contrary has surfaced. But that has done little to quell the speculation around Perry.
Last week, top House Democrats subpoenaed Perry’s records on the Trump administration’s interactions with Ukraine. A senior State Department official testified to Congress on Tuesday that the White House had assigned Perry, along with Gordon Sondland, ambassador to the European Union, and Kurt Volker, then an envoy to Ukraine, to put pressure on Ukraine, dubbing them the “three amigos,” said Rep. Gerry Connolly, DVa., according to media reports.
“I once believed Secretary Perry was one of the more upstanding members of the Cabinet,” said Rep. Paul Tonko, D-N.Y. “Now, we are learning that he was directly involved in the criminal wrongdoing of this administration with respect to Ukraine.”
But Perry still could have a long legal process in front of him, as the impeachment investigation continues. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has said he expects the House to complete its impeachment process by Thanksgiving, leaving the Senate time to complete its work by the end of the year.
But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has declined to give an estimate on when that will happen.
“The timeline will depend on the truth line,” she told reporters Thursday.