Top Railroad Safety Official Resigns, Amid Questions About Holding A Second Job

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Heath Hall, who became the Federal Railroad Administration's acting chief in June, resigned Saturday after a Politico report raised questions about whether he was simultaneously working another job.

NPR has confirmed the resignation with the Department of Transportation.

"DOT was unaware of the information that is being reported regarding outside work Heath Hall took on during his time at FRA, but those allegations, if true, are troubling," DOT said in a statement Saturday.

Hall had been on leave since early January for what the Department is calling a "family matter."

"Attempts to reach Hall were unsuccessful," Politico also reported Saturday.

According to Politico, after he became acting chief of an agency with a $1.7 billion dollar budget, he may have also been working as a public relations consultant in Mississippi:

"He subsequently appeared at least twice in local media reports last summer as a sheriff's spokesman in Madison County, Miss., where he has long run a public relations and political consulting firm." "The firm also continued to receive payments from the county for its services from July through December, despite Hall's pledge in a federal ethics form that the business would be "dormant" while he worked at DOT. And Tiffany Lindemann, a former FRA public affairs official who left the agency in September, told POLITICO this week that she had fielded at least three requests from a Mississippi television journalist seeking to speak with Hall during the summer. This was during a period when Hall was in charge of an agency with a $1.7 billion budget, overseeing the safety of 760 railroads, a multibillion-dollar freight rail industry and the safety of millions of passengers."

As Politico notes, it's not an ideal time for another leadership shake-up at the agency; last year marked the deadliest year in terms of railroad deaths nationwide in at least a decade.

In just the past two weeks, a train carrying House and Senate Republicans to their annual retreat struck a garbage truck, killing one person, and a train collision in South Carolina killed two and injured more than 100 more. In December, an Amtrak passenger train derailed and plummeted off an overpass in Washington state, killing three people.

The FRA hasn't had a permanent leader in more than a year, as Senate Democrats have blocked the confirmation of former railroad executive Ron Batory, who is President Trump's nominee for the position.

Juan Reyes, a New York attorney and the FRA's chief counsel, took over the acting administrator role when Hall went on leave, and he continues to lead the agency now.

NPR's Amy Held contributed to this report.</s>Mississippian Heath Hall who is the acting Federal Railroad Administration acting chief resigned Saturday according to Politico.com. Hall was appointed Deputy Administrator in June.

Hall, who was the former spokesperson for the Madison County Sheriff's Department, leaves the post at a time when the strain of the FRA hasn't had a permanent leader for more than a year while it investigates a string of deadly train crashes and deals with a rising trend of rail-related deaths.

In addition to being in charge of the FRA, Politico raised questions to the Department of Transportation about Hall simultaneously working as a public relations consultant in the magnolia state.

The ethics form from which Hall pledged promised that his public relations and political consulting firm would be "dormant" while working at DOT.

We reached out unsuccessfully to Hall for comment Saturday. We have also been unable to verify whether Hall did indeed resign.

This story will update when more information is available.</s>The acting chief of the Federal Railroad Administration resigned Saturday after a wesbite inquired whether he was moonlighting as a public relations consultant in Mississippi.

The departure of Heath Hall came as the agency is dealing with investigations into recent deadly railroad crashes -- and amid Senate Democrats' efforts to block the appointment of a permanent leader for the FRA, Politico reported.

According to the website, Hall has been on an extended leave of absence from the FRA, reportedly because of a family emergency. But since his appointment in June, he has worked for a public relations and political consulting firm in Madison County, Miss., despite having promised the firm would be “dormant” during his time at the FRA, Politico reported.

Records show the PR firm continued to receive payments from Madison County between July and December, Politico reported.

In addition, a former FRA employee told Politico she screened at least three requests last summer from Mississippi TV reporters trying to speak with Hall.

Hall oversaw the FRA’s $1.7 billion budget, a multibillion-dollar freight rail industry, and the safety of 760 railroads and millions of passengers.

Since January, FRA chief counsel Juan Reyes has been acting deputy administrator of the FRA. President Donald Trump has nominated longtime railroad executrive Ron Batory to lead the agency on a permanent basis, but Senate Democrats -- including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. -- have blocked a confirmation vote, Politico reported.

“Partisan obstruction has kept the Federal Railroad Administration, the top rail regulator, without an administrator,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a speech Monday, a day after two Amtrak employees died in a rail crash in South Carolina.

"The FRA administrator is the nation’s top rail safety regulator," McConnell continued. "There’s an urgent need, and a highly qualified candidate. I hope my colleagues across the aisle will put a stop to their partisan games on this front."

U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., also recently called out Schumer for blocking Batory's confirmation, during an interview last week with Fox News' Brian Kilmeade.

During the 1990s, Hall worked as public affairs director for then-Gov. Kirk Fordice of Mississippi, the Clarion-Ledger reported. He also sought a U.S. House seat in Mississippi in 1998, the newspaper reported.</s>The deputy administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration is stepping down "effective immediately," the Transportation Department declared Saturday, further casting leadership of the agency in doubt as Senate Democrats have placed a hold on President Trump's nominee to fill the role.

The exit of Heath Hall, who had been acting FRA administrator, comes after it was revealed that while he worked at the top federal railroad safety regulator, he also appeared in media reports as spokesman for a sheriff's department in Mississippi.

Hall has a public relations and political consulting firm in Madison County and Politico reported that it continued to receive payments from the county from July 2017, one month after Hall took over as acting administrator, to December. The report said Hall had committed to keeping those services "dormant" during his tenure at the Transportation Department in a federal ethics form.

“DOT was unaware of the information that is being reported regarding outside work Heath Hall took on during his time at FRA, but those allegations, if true, are troubling," a DOT spokesperson said in a statement sent to the Washington Examiner. "Mr. Hall has resigned his position at the Department effective immediately."

The DOT's webpage for administrator is currently blank. DOT says Hall was not the acting administrator when he resigned.

Since last fall, Democrats, led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., have stalled the nomination of railroad executive Ronald Batory with a procedural hold to protest the Trump administration's rejection of a deal to help fund a multi-billion dollar infrastructure project, known as the Gateway Program, which would connect lower Manhattan and New Jersey with a rail tunnel underneath the Hudson River.

After a train carrying Republican lawmakers to a retreat crashed into a truck in Virginia late last month, killing one and injuring others, Transportation Deputy Secretary Jeffrey Rosen complained that the Democrats' refusal to allow the nomination of Batory to proceed posed a danger to the public.

“While the circumstances of that crash are being reviewed by the Federal Railroad Administration, it is clear that the agency needs to have its chief rail safety official in place,” Rosen said in a letter to Schumer.

“Today's tragic accident is not the first one to occur during the lengthy delay,” Rosen added in the letter obtained by NBC News. “In the interest of public safety, I am asking that you set aside wholly unrelated issues and remove your hold on his nomination to become the Federal Railroad Administrator."

The Commerce Committee had approved of Batory's nomination in a unanimous vote last summer. According to Politico, Hall had already recently taken a leave of absence due to a family emergency.

FRA's chief counsel, Juan Reyes, will remain as acting deputy administrator, DOT said.

Editor's note: This story has been updated with a statement from DOT.</s>A senior Trump administration rail safety official resigned on Saturday after questions were raised about whether he was conducting outside work after taking the post, the US Transportation Department said. The department said in a statement Saturday that Heath Hall, who had served as the US Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA) acting administrator until last month, had resigned “effective immediately.”

The department added it “was unaware of the information that is being reported regarding outside work Heath Hall took on during his time at FRA, but those allegations, if true, are troubling.”

 Politico reported Saturday it had raised questions about whether Hall was simultaneously working as a public relations consultant for a Mississippi sheriff’s department.

Hall, who started work in June as deputy FRA administrator and served as acting administrator for more than six months, took a leave of absence last month for family reasons.

In January, FRA chief counsel Juan Reyes was named acting deputy administrator and has been running the agency on a day-to-day basis.

According to Hall’s financial disclosure report reviewed by Reuters, Hall agreed his “individually owned consulting business…will remain dormant during federal service.” Politico quoted a former FRA official who said that Hall was continuing to receive calls about the sheriff’s department while at the federal agency.

Hall could not immediately be reached Saturday.

During Hall’s tenure at the Federal Railroad Administration, there were a number of high-profile rail crashes.

In December, U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao urged the nation’s railroads and transit agencies to take all possible measures to meet deadlines to install a safety system called positive train control to prevent crashes.

Since then, FRA officials have held meetings with at least 29 transit agencies and railroads to discuss the status of the technology designed to prevent derailments or crashes caused by excessive speed.

A US House of Representatives committee plans to hold a hearing Thursday on the status of PTC efforts, including Amtrak’s chief executive and Reyes.

 Republicans complain Senate Democrats have delayed a vote for months on the nomination of Ronald Batory, a former Conrail president, to head the FRA after he was unanimously approved by the Senate Commerce Committee in August.</s>Feb. 10 (UPI) -- Heath Hall left his position with the Federal Railroad Administration after reports surface that he also was working as a public-relations consultant for the Madison County, Miss., sheriff's office.

Hall, appointed to the FRA in June, had pledged on a federal ethics form that his firm wouldn't be active while he worked at the department, yet the firm continued to collect payments from Madison County between July and December.

Hall became the FRA's acting chief after being appointed deputy administrator in June, overseeing a $1.7 billion budget and 760 railroads. Last summer, he was seen twice in local media reports as a Madison County, Miss., sheriff's department spokesman.

Last month, Hall took an extended leave of absence for a family emergency, but DOT officials said his departure is now permanent.

"We were unaware of the information that is being reported but those allegations, if they are true, are troubling," said Marianne McInerney, spokeswoman for the Department of Transportation, via a statement. "Heath Hall has resigned his position at the department effective immediately."

Hall became acting administrator while Ron Batory, President Donald Trump's nominee, awaits Senate confirmation, which has stalled since July.

Currently in the role is Juan Reyes, the agency's chief counsel, who had taken over the position in January after Hall went on leave of absence.

Hall's departure comes at a time when the agency needs a key leader after recent crashes including four fatal Amtrak crashes since December. Last year, railroad deaths mounted to 828, the highest in a decade, according to FRA data.</s>WASHINGTON, DC — A key official at the agency responsible for overseeing the nation’s railroad safety has resigned after “troubling” allegations that he was still working as a public relations consultant in Mississippi.

Heath Hall, who was appointed deputy administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration last June and later named the acting administrator, “has resigned his position at the Department effective immediately,” a Department of Transportation spokeswoman told CNN Saturday.

“DOT was unaware of the information that is being reported regarding outside work Heath Hall took on during his time at FRA, but those allegations, if true, are troubling,” the DOT spokeswoman told CNN.

While serving at the Federal Railroad Administration, Hall was also quoted in at least one Mississippi news article as a spokesman for the Madison County sheriff, which was a client of the public relations and consulting agency he owned in Mississippi.

Hall’s firm, Strategic Marketing Group, continued to receive payments from July to December of last year, according to local records, despite his statement on an ethics form that his business would “remain dormant during Federal service.”

Hall did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment Saturday.

Hall was not the acting administrator when he resigned, as he had been on a leave of absence since January.

Hall stepped into the role of acting administrator while President Donald Trump’s nominee, Ron Batory, awaited Senate confirmation. Batory’s nomination has been stalled since July, when he was tapped by Trump to lead the agency.

The man in charge for now is acting deputy administrator Juan Reyes, who is also the agency’s chief counsel. The FRA has been without a permanent director since Trump took office.</s>A top official charged with overseeing the safety of the nation's railroads has resigned "effective immediately," the Department of Transportation said Saturday after POLITICO raised questions about whether he was simultaneously working as a public relations consultant in Mississippi.

The news comes at a time of strain for the Federal Railroad Administration, which hasn’t had a permanent leader for more than a year while it investigates a string of fatal train crashes and deals with a rising trend of rail-related deaths.

Heath Hall became the Federal Railroad Administration's acting chief after being appointed deputy administrator in June. But he subsequently appeared at least twice in local media reports last summer as a sheriff's department spokesman in Madison County, Miss., where he has long run a public relations and political consulting firm.

The firm also continued to receive payments from the county for its services from July through December, despite Hall's pledge in a federal ethics form that the business would be "dormant" while he worked at DOT. And Tiffany Lindemann, a former FRA public affairs official who left the agency in September, told POLITICO this week that she had fielded at least three requests from a Mississippi television journalist seeking to speak with Hall during the summer. 



This was during a period when Hall was in charge of an agency with a $1.7 billion budget, overseeing the safety of 760 railroads, a multibillion-dollar freight rail industry and the safety of millions of passengers.

Hall has been on an extended leave of absence since last month due to what the FRA has described as a family emergency. But DOT officials said Saturday, after reviewing POLITICO's latest questions, that his departure is now permanent.

“We were unaware of the information that is being reported but those allegations, if they are true, are troubling," DOT spokeswoman Marianne McInerney said in a statement Saturday. She added, "Heath Hall has resigned his position at the Department effective immediately.”

Since January, the agency's reins have rested in the hands of chief counsel Juan Reyes, a New York attorney with a background primarily in public-private partnerships, who became the acting deputy administrator in January.

But that still leaves the agency without a Senate-confirmed administrator with the leeway to make big policy decisions. Senate Democrats, including Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, have blocked a confirmation vote for President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the agency, former railroad executive Ron Batory.

It’s a bad time for the agency to have a leadership vacuum: Amtrak has experienced four fatal crashes since December, including one involving a train carrying members of Congress to a Republican retreat in West Virginia. Last year’s 828 railroad deaths nationwide was the highest total in at least a decade, according to FRA data. And many railroads are set to miss an end-of-year deadline to install a crash-prevention technology that has spawned years of friction between the industry and Congress.

“I think a leaderless and rudderless agency is less effective,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a vocal rail safety advocate. “And this one has a preeminently serious and potentially life-and-death responsibility for safety on our railroads.”

Others who deal with the agency fear that a shortage of top leaders will slow its work.

"It's just a lot for anyone to do," said Jo Strang, a former FRA official who's now senior vice president for safety and regulatory policy at the American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association. "You're supposed to have three bodies filling those slots, and you have one.”

Republicans have made the most noise about the blockade on Batory, using the issue to blast Schumer after each fatal train wreck in recent weeks.

“This worrying spate of accidents offers a sobering reminder that partisan obstruction has kept the Federal Railroad Administration, the top rail regulator, without an administrator,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a speech Monday, a day after two Amtrak employees died in a collision between a passenger train and freight train in South Carolina.

Batory “has more than 40 years of rail experience,” added McConnell, who is also the husband of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. “I know of no questions about his qualifications.”

Schumer has held up a vote on Batory while pushing for more federal money for a massive rail project in and around New York City. His office declined to comment this past week about the nomination or calls for him to end his blockade.

While Batory waits in limbo, he’s serving as a senior rail adviser to Chao but cannot make decisions or issue orders, the railroad agency said.

Meanwhile, Hall briefly took the agency’s reins when he became deputy administrator — and acting administrator — in June. But he requested a leave of absence in January “so that he could address an urgent family matter,” the FRA said in a statement Friday, two weeks after POLITICO reported that he had departed. “He remains on leave.”

Before then, there appeared to be some uncertainty about how single-mindedly Hall carried out his task.

Hall, who ran a PR and consulting firm called Strategic Marketing Group LLC in Madison, Miss., pledged in his financial disclosure form last year that the business “will remain dormant during Federal service.” State records indicate his wife, Wendy, took over from him as the company’s “Manager, Member, President” on May 11.

But Heath Hall’s name continued to show up sporadically in news reports in Mississippi as a spokesman for the Madison County Sheriff's Department — including an August report on a Jackson television station’s website about the drug and DUI arrest of a police dispatcher. A segment that aired in August on a second Jackson TV station cited Hall as a sheriff’s spokesman in a story about a carjacking, though he did not appear on camera.

Lindemann, the former public affairs official at the railroad agency, said the Mississippi reporter who kept calling for Hall "was adamant about the fact that Heath was the [public information officer] for the sheriff’s department,” based on what he'd been told.

Lindemann said she didn't remember what news outlet the journalist represented and didn't know whether he ever made contact with Hall.

Madison County Sheriff Randy Tucker could not be reached for comment. But county records show that Hall’s firm received $12,000 in payments through the sheriff’s department from July through December, though it's unclear in the records whether the payments were for services before or after he took the job in Washington.

Hall’s company even got a no-bid, $75,000 public relations contract from the county Board of Supervisors the same week he joined DOT — a move that brought objections from two of the five board members, who wondered why the county wasn’t letting other firms compete for the work. The supervisor who pushed the contract was one of Hall’s firm’s clients, the Madison County Journal reported at the time.

One supervisor, Sheila Jones, questioned whether the consultant had done much to earn his pay when the county had previously hired the company. “I asked him to show up at all the meetings, and he didn’t,” she said, according to a recording of the debate.

Hall declined the latest contract days later, the Madison County Journal reported, saying that “now is not the right time to add the County our portfolio of clients.”

In its initial answers about Hall's employment this week, the railroad agency said he “has exceeded federal legal requirements by signing the ethics pledge pursuant to the President’s Executive Order.” The agency added that Hall was recused from any work “substantially related to his former employer or clients.”

Asked in November about the Madison County Journal reports, a DOT spokeswoman told POLITICO that Hall's firm “is fully dormant and is not accepting any clients. Mr. Hall is fully focused on his duties as the FRA Deputy Administrator in an effort to help strengthen [the] organization’s mission.”

The spokeswoman also said political appointees like Hall who don't need Senate confirmation were not required to divest from their business as long as it posed “no area of conflict including time.”

Still, Meredith McGehee, a government ethics expert and strategic adviser at the Campaign Legal Center, said it “raises serious conflicts” for someone to serve as a spokesman for both a federal agency and a local government body. "Your first and primary responsibility is to your position as a public official," she said.

Whoever oversees the agency — for now it’s Reyes — has a full plate of issues to contend with.

Those include enforcing a December deadline for railroads to implement a anti-collision technology called positive train control, which Congress first mandated in 2008 after a deadly collision in California. The FRA can grant extensions of up to two years in some cases, and dozens of the 41 railroads affected by the mandate are expected to start asking for more time this summer. Reyes will testify this week before a House Transportation subcommittee on positive train control implementation.

While the FRA has dozens of employees dedicated to the issue, lawmakers will typically look to the political leadership when holding the agency accountable for its work. The agency said Friday that Chao has gotten involved personally, writing in January to 41 railroads and “reminding them of this important safety mandate.”

“Safety is and always will be the FRA’s top priority,” the agency said.
Heath Hall, the acting Federal Railroad Administration chief, resigns "effective immediately" over a Politico report that he has a second job in Madison County, Mississippi.