As John Kerry comes under intense scrutiny for rekindling climate talks with the Chinese, the U.S. State Department made it clear he reports to nobody but President Biden.
“Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry reports directly to the President,” a State Department spokesperson told the Herald Monday.
The one-line response came as new emails show Kerry — the nation’s first Special Presidential Envoy for Climate — has a “proposed staff” of 45 positions. That’s the same-sized office set up to combat ISIS, his staffers pointed out.
Those emails also state everyone reports to Kerry alone. The Climate office informed the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee of that fact, the emails show.
A State Department spokesman now confirms Kerry does not answer to U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and goes straight to the Oval Office.
That’s a problem, says Michael Chamberlain, director of Protect the Public’s Trust. His watchdog organization is suing Kerry’s office to unlock the super-secret workings of the Special Presidential Envoy for Climate.
“For an individual with the level of authority that John Kerry possesses to operate not only outside the Senate confirmation process but also not report to the head of the agency he ostensibly works for seems, at the very least, tremendously unusual, at worst, in violation of the Senate’s advice and consent authority,” Chamberlain said Monday night.
“It’s little wonder that staff in the (Climate) office are so secretive and even their responses to Congressional oversight are cryptic and dismissive,” Chamberlain added. “The more that Protect the Public’s Trust, Congressional representatives, and media discover about this secretive office, the more questions and concerns become apparent.”
The State Department did not address the Herald’s public records request for a rundown of Kerry’s staff now that it’s been established he employs 44 people under him. The Herald has been told to expect that payroll by October 2024, a mere month before the next presidential election.
Chamberlain also pointed out that Kerry’s Climate gig is up in May of 2024, so any reports that may follow will be moot.
The latest batch of emails shared with the Herald from Protect the Public’s Trust state Kerry’s office staff is “similar in size to the Office of Special Presidential Envoy to Combat ISIS during the Obama administration.”
Brett McGurk was announced as the ISIS special envoy by then-Secretary of State John Kerry in October of 2015. “He probably did have to report to Kerry in that role,” Chamberlain said.
Despite saying communication is “robust” between Blinken and Kerry today — including on Kerry’s “travel” — one email specifically points out “the Special Envoy for Climate is the senior Administration and Department official responsible for climate change policy, and as such, foreign governments do communicate regularly with” Kerry “on climate matters alone.”
That nugget comes as House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., told Fox News Friday he’s concerned about Kerry engaging in international talks despite having never been confirmed by the Senate
“For the past two years, the Biden Administration has withheld information on John Kerry’s role within the Administration despite the committee’s many requests,” Comer told Fox. “He was not confirmed by the Senate. He is not held accountable by the American people. He is skirting congressional oversight and that is unacceptable.”
The Herald has also reported on Kerry’s possible use of a private email account for official government business. Emails released through a records request show staffers scrambling to downplay titles and a memo cc’d to a Gmail account that appears to be for Kerry.
The emails are heavily redacted but do reveal some of the inner workings of the first-of-its-kind agency.
One key email shows that on Jan. 31, 2022, a “Manchin discussion/engagement” dispatch was cc’d to “John F Kerry (redacted) @gmail.com.” That same email about U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., is also cc’d to “Kerry, John F (redacted) @state.gov.”
If Kerry is using a Gmail account for Biden administration business, it would be similar to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state that triggered an FBI probe days before the 2016 election. She was never charged, but she lost that presidential race to Donald Trump.