Watchdog finds FEMA chief cost government $151K on unauthorized travel: report

An internal investigation has found that Brock Long, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), spent $151,000 on unauthorized travel, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Long used government vehicles and employees to cart him and his family around during a trip to Hawaii that included both official functions and vacation, according to a report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general, which the Journal obtained.

Long ran up $94,000 in salary costs, $55,000 in travel expenditures and $2,000 in maintenance-related costs. 

{mosads}Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said in a statement Friday night that she had ordered Long to pay back the government “as appropriate.” 

A spokesman for Nielsen told the Journal on Tuesday that she and Long had yet to reach an agreement on the total he will pay.

Long said Friday that he took “full responsibility for any mistakes that were made by me or the agency.”

He added that he and Nielsen were “taking corrective action to prevent such mistakes from happening in the future.”

Long came under public scrutiny after Politico reported last week that he and other staffers used government resources to take weekend trips to North Carolina. 

The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill.