Tommy Beaudreau, a former high-level official in the Interior Department under President Obama, won broad bipartisan support as the Senate voted 88-9 June 17 to approve his nomination to No. 2 spot in Interior.
Beaudreau especially had drawn praise from Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), respectively the chairman and top minority member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
“During his confirmation hearing, he clearly demonstrated that he understands the role of the Department of the Interior in striking the balance in its dual mission of preserving and protecting our national parks and public lands and providing a large part of the energy and mineral resources that we need to power the nation,” Manchin said June 17.
The previous day, Barrasso said of the nominee, “He can serve as a voice of reason in an administration that is waging a war on American energy workers.”
Beaudreau became director of the newly organized Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in 2011. He was promoted to Interior chief of staff in 2016.
In Interior he contributed to development of the tougher offshore well control regulations for oil and gas companies that were written over the course of several years in the wake of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. He also helped advance offshore wind project development.
In 2017, Beaudreau went to work as an attorney at the law firm Latham & Watkins, where his colleagues included several other veterans of Interior during the Obama administration.
Some environmental activists voiced opposition to his nomination a few months ago because they disapproved of his Latham & Watkins client list, which included oil and gas companies and a coal company. They were not mollified that his clients also included the National Audubon Society, nor that promoters of offshore wind energy lavished praise on him.
