Don’t ask questions if you don’t want the answers. That seems to be the game plan that Gov. Tina Kotek and others have adopted in fielding concerns over the role of Kotek’s wife in the governor’s administration. It’s far easier to pretend everything’s fine if you never ask what’s wrong.
But this self-serving approach is also self-sabotaging. Three of the governor’s top aides – veteran strategists who were key to Kotek’s first-year success – left the office earlier this year, reportedly due to conflicts over First Lady Aimee Kotek Wilson’s role. Internal emails show their repeated attempts to establish clear boundaries around responsibilities, expectations and conduct for Kotek Wilson, who, as an unpaid “volunteer,” participated in staff behavioral health policy meetings, met with drug company representatives and pushed various ideas onto Oregon Health Authority leadership. And the revelations, reminiscent of the scandal that forced former Gov. John Kitzhaber to resign in 2015, have alarmed many Oregonians who fear the state is in for another ride with a top elected official putting personal priorities above the public’s.
Even with additional staff departures, Kotek has stubbornly ignored the questions that any responsible boss, much less the governor of Oregon, should consider: Whether her wife’s involvement impairs the work of her office and how to manage the human resources, legal, ethical and other challenges raised by the power imbalance of having the boss’ spouse in the workplace. Instead, the governor is offering cosmetic changes that give off the vibe of doing the right thing without actually doing so.
The latest sign of the ask-no-questions approach came at last month’s Oregon Government Ethics Commission’s meeting. Commissioners nominated by Democrats voted down efforts by the Republican-nominated commissioners to authorize a full investigation into ethics complaints against Kotek, a Democrat, over her wife’s involvement in the office. The dismissal, recommended by the agency’s executive director, was based on her preliminary investigation finding that Kotek and her wife did not appear to have personally profited – as Kitzhaber and his partner had – and so had not violated ethics laws.
That “preliminary investigation,” however, included no interviews, executive director Susan Myers said in an email to the editorial board. Instead, she relied on publicly released emails, news stories and written responses from the governor and first lady to determine whether a “substantial objective basis” existed to believe there may have been ethics violations. She did not reach out to any of those who left the office, including Kotek’s former chief of staff Andrea Cooper, former special adviser Abby Tibbs and deputy chief of staff Lindsey O’Brien – people who could have provided far more information about their concerns than what was revealed in those limited emails.
Additionally, while Myers emphasized the lack of evidence that Kotek and Kotek Wilson reaped any financial benefit, she did not address the troubling issues raised by a May Willamette Week piece. The story notes that Kotek Wilson personally met with drug representatives of Janssen Pharmaceuticals and pressed the Oregon Health Authority’s behavioral health director to meet with them. Less than three months after the first lady’s meeting, Janssen’s parent company plunked down a $5,000 contribution to Kotek’s political action committee. While that’s not particularly high in a state with unlimited contributions, it was still double the amount the company had previously made to any Oregon politician, as Willamette Week’s Nigel Jaquiss reported.
Nor did Myers delve deeply into the particulars of an incident earlier this year in which Kotek had her behavioral health policy adviser call Cascadia Behavioral Health on behalf of a friend of Kotek Wilson’s who was upset with her supervisor. The incident, only vaguely described in a February email, was “highly inappropriate at best,” according to an email from Tibbs to the adviser. The email also noted that the governor had been “reminded several times now” of the power she and her wife hold and “the appropriate use of that power.”
Such emails and concerns should raise additional questions that deserve a fuller investigation. But those in power have to be willing to ask them.
The biggest responsibility lies with Kotek, however, who has done the bare minimum to address the underlying concerns. Responding to public outcry earlier this year, she announced she will no longer create an “Office of the First Spouse,” but she remains committed to carving out a role for her wife. For guidance, she sent the ethics commission – the same agency that just voted to stop digging into Kotek’s actions – three questions about the propriety of a partner’s involvement in supporting the governor’s priorities. But formalizing a role for her wife raises many more issues than those covered by the narrow ethical laws that the commission handles. Their answers will be limited and permissive, as Kotek surely knows.
If Kotek genuinely wants to keep her agenda and Oregon moving forward, she must embrace much more scrutiny and input from officials who aren’t beholden to her. She should ask the attorney general or labor commissioner – while both are fellow Democrats, they are independently elected officials – to conduct an inquiry into the impact her wife has had on the office, including interviewing those who left and those who remain. And to create a legitimate, credible role for Kotek Wilson in her administration, the governor should work with the attorney general and labor commissioner for direction on installing policies for handling conflicts, bias, conduct concerns and other essential guardrails for an effective workplace. While Kotek Wilson has personal and professional experience in behavioral health, she was neither elected nor hired to take on policymaking. It’s fair to insist on clear guidelines for such an unusual situation.
Unfortunately, even now, when asked if she would consider seeking an independent review of her wife’s role and soliciting feedback from staff, Kotek declined. In an email sent by her spokeswoman, Kotek said “there is no precedent I am aware of for the scenario you are describing. Furthermore, I have the team and structure in place that I need to meet the obligations of my office and that is my primary focus at this point.”
Her answer is a dodge. The lack of a precedent is exactly why she should be asking these questions. The demonstrated impact on her team is exactly why Oregonians should worry about her ability to meet the obligations of her office. Instead, Kotek repeatedly points out that her wife is a volunteer, as if her unpaid status should be a shield against scrutiny of the many other ways nepotistic behavior can destroy morale, erode the public’s trust and derail her agenda for Oregon’s rebound.
Oregonians chose Kotek to tackle the state’s homelessness, behavioral health and government accountability crises when they elected her governor. But now their biggest question for her is how she will navigate this dilemma between personal goals and public needs. It’s a question that Kotek must answer with unambiguous action that shows her priorities.
-The Oregonian/OregonLive Editorial Board