Dear Mr. Secretary:

In a July 6, 2012, letter, the Department of the Interior (“Department”) was provided a final opportunity to establish by the close of business on July 12, 2012 a mutually agreed upon schedule for transcribed interviews of five Department officials by Committee on Natural Resources (“Committee”) majority oversight staff. These interviews were to be conducted the week of July 16, 2012.

These five individuals, among other officials, are believed to have personal knowledge directly relevant to the Committee’s long-running investigation into the Obama Administration’s decision imposing a Gulf of Mexico drilling moratorium and its drafting and editing of a May 2010 Department report (“Drilling Moratorium Report”) that falsely stated independent engineers had peer reviewed and supported the moratorium when they did not. The Committee originally requested to interview these five individuals in February 2012. The Department, however, did not respond in a timely manner to that request.

Read the entire letter HERE.