Scott Angelle

Scott Anthony Angelle (born November 20, 1961) is an American politician who is the former director of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement in Washington, D.C. From 2013 to 2017, he was the District 2 member of the Louisiana Public Service Commission, an elected five-person utility regulatory body.

From 2000 to 2004, Angelle was the first parish president of St. Martin Parish and the vice president from 1998 to 2000 of the Huval Companies in Lafayette, Louisiana.

Earlier, he worked as a petroleum land manager in Lafayette.

From 2004 to 2012, with the exception of his six months as lieutenant governor, Angelle was the secretary of the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources under Governors Kathleen Babineaux Blanco and then Bobby Jindal.

He replaced Jack Caldwell.

In 2010, Angelle served six months as lieutenant governor.

As part of the interim appointment as lieutenant governor, Angelle agreed not to seek the position in the special election held in November 2010.

The vacancy occurred when Mitch Landrieu resigned to become the mayor of New Orleans.

Angelle was a Democrat until he switched to the Republican affiliation on October 26, 2010.

Both parties had attempted to recruit Angelle to run for Louisiana's 3rd congressional district in the 2010 elections to succeed Democrat Charlie Melancon, who ran instead for the U. S. Senate in 2010 against Republican David Vitter, whom Angelle also opposed in the 2015 gubernatorial race.

Earlier, Angelle had declined the overtures from both parties to run for Congress.

Angelle officially began the duties of lieutenant governor on May 17, 2010.

He temporarily relinquished the job of secretary of the Department of Natural Resources to Robert Harper but continued to serve as the governor's lobbyist to the legislature.

Angelle returned to his position in Natural Resources after his time as lieutenant governor ended.

On July 21, 2010, Angelle led a rally of over 12,000 citizens in Lafayette's Cajundome demanding the federal government to "Lift the Moratorium Now!"

President Barack Obama had imposed the 2010 United States deepwater drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

There, Angelle notably said, "This moratorium is not hurting the stock holders of BP, or Exxon or Chevron; this moratorium is hurting the Cheramies, and the Calais, and the Dupuis, and the Robins and the Boudreauxs, and the Thibodeauxs," referring to the negative effect on the local economy that the moratorium may have.

The moratorium was lifted in October 2010, a move considered a pivotal point in Angelle's political career.

Angelle resigned on August 8, 2012, and he was replaced by Stephen Chustz.

As Angelle resigned from the Natural Resources position, Jindal nominated him to represent Louisiana's 3rd congressional district on the Board of Supervisors of Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

On August 3, 2012, it was discovered that the Bayou Corne sinkhole in Assumption Parish, Louisiana

was the result of a collapsed salt dome operated by the Texas Brine Company.

This collapse

allowed oil and gases to escape and surface.

Angelle has received criticism for leaving

his Department of Natural Resources position five days after the disaster began, however,

it was later discovered that the sinkhole was due to months of seismic activity that The Texas Brine Company

ignored.

As of October 2014, the sinkhole is still ongoing while local residents continue a legal battle with the Texas Brine Company.

In 2015, he ran for governor as a Republican in the October 24 election and finished in third place with 214,907 votes (19.3 percent).

On September 25, 2015, Assumption Parish President, Martin Triche, stated

"To suggest that Scott Angelle abandoned Bayou Corne and Assumption Parish is nothing short of completely false. Senator Vitter was not there for our residents when Scott was."

Ryan Cross, Angelle's gubernatorial campaign manager said, "Scott had already made the decision he was going to run for PSC. He jumpstarted the response and coordinated it on the ground. He was one of the first people down at the sinkhole site."

In 2016, Angelle was an unsuccessful candidate for Louisiana's 3rd congressional district seat held by Charles Boustany, who instead ran unsuccessfully for the United States Senate seat vacated by retiring Republican David Vitter.

Angelle's opponents included Lafayette businessman and retired Army Lt. Colonel Greg Ellison, former state Representative Brett Geymann of Lake Charles, former United States Ambassador to East Timor Grover Rees III, and, the eventual winner, Clay Higgins, a former spokesperson for the St. Landry Parish Sheriff's Office who gained attention for his Crime Stoppers videos that harshly attack the criminal element.

In May 2017, Angelle was appointed as the fourth director for the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement in the United States Department of the Interior under Secretary Ryan Zinke.

The post does not require confirmation by the United States Senate.

Angelle is an honor graduate of the St. Martin Parish public schools.

He holds a Bachelor of Science in Petroleum Land Management and is a cum laude graduate of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

Angelle was elected at the age of twenty-five to the St. Martin Parish Police Jury, the local governing body known as the county commission in most other states.