Trump official was effectively removed in July for failing to track separated migrant families: report
By: Carter Sherman, VICE News, October 23, 2018
Scott Lloyd was effectively stopped from managing the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement in mid-July, Politico reported Tuesday, after his office struggled to help reunite families separated at the border under the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy.
As ORR director, Lloyd, who has very little experience in refugee resettlement, made decisions that made it more difficult to reunite children with their families, sources told Politico. Not only did the office reportedly not set up a spreadsheet to calculate and follow separated families, but its employees did not obey an order from Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar to start reviewing families’ case files.
Azar ended up stopping Lloyd, a Trump appointee, from running the office’s day-to-day operations, according to Politico.
Assistant Secretary for Family Support Lynn Johnson is now conducting a “top-to-bottom” review of the agency’s refugee resettlement program, Johnson told Politico. She has not made any personnel decisions, she said, and she complimented Lloyd when asked about him.
…
Last week, the Campaign for Accountability asked for an ethics investigation into Lloyd, after the abortion rights-supporting watchdog group uncovered emails showing that Lloyd had forwarded an email from his old employer. An executive order by President Donald Trump forbids presidential appointees from participating in matters involving their former employers in any professional capacity.