FILE - In this April 3, 2018, file photo, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt speaks at a news conference in Washington. An internal government watchdog says the EPA violated federal... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this April 3, 2018, file photo, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt speaks at a news conference in Washington. An internal government watchdog says the EPA violated federal spending laws when purchasing a $43,000 soundproof privacy booth for Pruitt to make private phone... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this April 3, 2018, file photo, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt speaks at a news conference in Washington. An internal government watchdog says the EPA violated federal spending laws when purchasing a $43,000 soundproof privacy booth for Pruitt to make private phone... (Associated Press) FILE - In this April 3, 2018, file photo, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt speaks at a news conference in Washington. An internal government watchdog says the EPA violated federal... (Associated Press) 
 
 WASHINGTON (AP) — An internal government watchdog says the Environmental Protection Agency violated federal spending laws when purchasing a $43,000 soundproof privacy booth for Administrator Scott Pruitt to make private phone calls in his office. 
 
 The Government Accountability Office issued its findings Monday in a letter to Senate Democrats who had requested a review of Pruitt's spending. 
 
 GAO General Counsel Thomas Armstrong determined that EPA's purchase of the booth violated federal law prohibiting agencies from spending more than $5,000 to make improvements to the offices of presidential appointees without informing Congress. Because EPA used federal money in a manner specifically prohibited by law, Armstrong said the agency also violated the Antideficiency Act, and is legally obligated to report that violation to Congress. 
 
 EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman said the agency is "addressing GAO's concern, with regard to congressional notification about this expense, and will be sending Congress the necessary information this week." 
 
 EPA has said previously that Pruitt needed the privacy booth to make secure phone calls with President Donald Trump and others without fear of eavesdropping. It is among several unusual security precautions taken by Pruitt that are now under scrutiny, like his use frequent use of first-class flights to avoid unpleasant interactions with other travelers. 
 
 The Associated Press first reported in December that EPA also spent about $9,000 for an outside contractor to sweep Pruitt's office for secret listening devices and installed biometric locks. 
 
 Democratic Sen. Tom Udall of New Mexico, who requested the GAO review, said the finding was yet another example of the embattled EPA administrator flouting federal spending rules. 
 
 "An illegal privacy booth to conduct secret discussions with his polluter friends does nothing to help our health or environment," Udall said Monday. "Scott Pruitt is behaving like swamp emperor rather than EPA administrator — he has shown a shocking lack of regard for public health and safety, ethics and fairness. He has been a disaster, and it's past time for him to go." 
 
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 Follow Associated Press environmental reporter Michael Biesecker at http://twitter.com/mbieseck 
 
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 This story has been corrected to say Sen. Udall is from New Mexico. 

 A government watchdog agency concluded that the Environmental Protection Agency violated federal laws in spending more than $43,000 to install a private phone booth in EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s office. 
 
 The Government Accountability Office found that the EPA did not comply with the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act by failing to notify Congress before spending more than $5,000 on the phone booth. 
 
 According to Section 710 of that law, any agency or department head or government employee appointed by the president must inform relevant members of Congress before spending more than $5,000 “to furnish, or redecorate … or to purchase furniture or make improvements” to an office. 
 
 Yuri Gripas/Reuters 
 
 The EPA “was required to notify the appropriations committees of its proposed obligation,” the GAO wrote in the report. “By failing to provide such advance notice, EPA violated the provision. 
 
 The agency also violated another law, the Antideficiency Act, by spending "in a manner specifically prohibited by law" the independent, non-political government agency that investigates spending of taxpayer money on behalf of Congress also concluded. 
 
 The GAO’s report said that their finding only focused on whether the EPA notified Congress in advance, as it was required to do under the act, and not on whether the phone booth was the best way to provide a secure phone line for the administrator. 
 
 “Because EPA did not comply with the notification requirement, the funds were not legally available at the time EPA incurred the obligation,” the GAO wrote in the report. 
 
 Kevin Lamarque/Reuters, FILE 
 
 The EPA spent more than $43,000 to install a "secure phone booth" in Pruitt's office last year, according to agency documents obtained by American Oversight, a watchdog group founded by former Obama administration officials. 
 
 Pruitt told a congressional committee he needed the booth to make secure calls to the White House and discuss classified information, but he was unable to tell the lawmakers how often he would use it. The agency previously declined to publicly provide specific details about the private phone booth and whether it technically meets the requirements of a SCIF — a facility used for secure communications to discuss classified information. The EPA already two SCIFs elsewhere in its headquarters, according to the GAO report. 
 
 In a letter to the GAO, the EPA also argued that spending on the booth did not need to comply with with the appropriations law because it was not an “aesthetic improvement,” but an expense to facilitate agency business. 
 
 "The privacy booth in analogous to other functional items an employee might require to perform his job duties such as a high speed computer, high speed copier/scanner, or television,” the deputy general counsel wrote in a memo provided to ABC News by an EPA official. 
 
 The EPA also argued that the money for the booth came from the part of the agency’s budget that includes money for administrative needs and is used for maintenance costs at EPA headquarters. 
 
 The GAO found that explanation “inconsistent” with the provision, according to the report, but did not issue a judgment on Pruitt’s need for a secure phone booth. “GAO recognizes the requirement to protect classified material and draws no conclusions regarding whether the installation of the privacy booth was the only, or the best way for EPA to provide a secure telephone line for the Administrator,” the agency said in a statement. “EPA’s failure to comply with a governmentwide statutory requirement that an agency notify the appropriations committees before it spends more than $5,000 for the office of a Presidential appointee is the only legal issue addressed in this opinion.” 
 
 The EPA said in a statement that they are addressing the GAO’s concern and will be sending information to Congress this week. 
 
 The agency concluded that the EPA should report the violations, which would require a report to the President and Congress, according to federal law. 
 
 Both the GAO and the EPA inspector general, the agency’s internal watchdog, were asked by members of Congress to look into the cost of Pruitt’s “secure phone booth.” The EPA internal watchdog agreed to look into the phone booth but canceled its inquiry so as not to duplicate the GAO's report. 
 
 The cost of Pruitt’s security has become a source of scrutiny for watchdogs and Congress. The EPA IG is looking into the cost of Pruitt’s security detail and his travel, including frequent first-class flights that the agency says were recommended by the administrator’s detail. 
 
 The EPA has said that Pruitt needs a 24-7 security detail in response to an unprecedented number of threats against him compared to previous administrators. But recently members of Congress have questioned the need for that security. 
 
 Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and Tom Carper, D- Delaware, said they have reviewed internal EPA documents that found Pruitt’s security detail exaggerated threats against him to justify spending on his security and first-class flights. 
 
 The Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Trey Gowdy, R-SC, has also asked for an interview with the head of Pruitt’s security detail and documents explaining how the agency justified his first-class flights and the need for more spending on security. 
 
 Gowdy said in an interview on Sunday that he wants to know if the EPA is misusing taxpayer money and questioned that first-class flights are necessary for security reasons. 
 
 "So the notion that I've got to fly first class because I don't want people to be mean to me, you need to go into another line of work if you don't want people to be mean to you. Like maybe a monk, where you don't come in contact with anyone,” Gowdy said on Fox News Sunday. 
 
 Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minnesota, a member of the House Appropriations Committee who oversees the EPA’s budget, said Monday that “There are few greater examples of government waste than a $43,000 phone booth.” 
 
 “Now we know that the purchase wasn’t just unnecessary and wasteful, but actually illegal. The American people deserve so much better than the culture of corruption, cronyism, and incompetence that is pervasive in the Trump administration and the Pruitt EPA.” 
 
 Editor's Note: The original version of this story incorrectly said that documents on spending on the secure phone booth were provided by the Environmental Integrity Project, a non-partisan and non-profit watchdog group. Those documents were obtained by American Oversight. 

 The nearly $43,000 soundproof phone booth Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt had installed in his office last year violated federal spending laws, the Government Accountability Office said Monday. 
 
 In an eight-page letter to lawmakers, GAO general counsel Thomas H. Armstrong said the agency failed to notify lawmakers that it was exceeding the $5,000 limit for agency heads to furnish, redecorate or otherwise make improvements to their offices. In addition, Armstrong wrote, the agency also violated the federal Antideficiency Act, “because EPA obligated appropriated funds in a manner specifically prohibited by law.” 
 
 The EPA had argued that the almost $25,000 customized phone booth — which required painting, concrete and electrical work totaling more than $18,000 to reconfigure the small closet area where it was placed — was not part of a redecoration of Pruitt’s office and should not be subject to the $5,000 cap. 
 
 While the agency maintains other areas in its building where officials can place secure calls, and while none of Pruitt’s predecessors have had such a setup, the agency argued the privacy booth allows Pruitt to “make and receive calls to discuss sensitive information … (up to the top secret level) for the purpose of conducting agency business.” It also argued that the booth was “analogous to other functional items an employee might require to perform his job duties such as a high speed computer, high speed copier/scanner, or television.” 
 
 The GAO did not buy those arguments. Rather, Armstrong wrote the booth met the criteria to be included under federal requirements that dictate agency heads stick to a $5,000 limit in upgrading their offices. As such, he wrote, “EPA was required to notify appropriations committees of its proposed obligation.” 
 
 Armstrong made it clear Monday the decision was not a ruling on whether the EPA and Pruitt should have installed the high-priced phone booth to begin with. 
 
 “We draw no conclusions regarding whether the installation of the privacy booth was the only, or the best, way for EPA to provide a secure telephone line for the Administrator,” he wrote. “EPA’s failure to make the necessary notification is the only subject of this opinion.” 
 
 In an email Monday, EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman reiterated Armstrong’s point, saying GAO “recognized” the “need for employees to have access to a secure telephone line’ when handling sensitive information.” 
 
 “EPA is addressing GAO’s concern, with regard to congressional notification about this expense, and will be sending Congress the necessary information this week,” Bowman said, adding EPA’s general counsel had reached a different legal conclusion from GAO and did not believe the agency needed to give lawmakers advance warning about the upgrade. 
 
 Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, the Republican chairman of the Senate committee that oversees the EPA, said in a statement Monday that the agency owes lawmakers an explanation. “It is critical that EPA and all federal agencies comply with notification requirements to Congress before spending tax payer dollars,” Barrasso said. “EPA must give a full public accounting of this expenditure and explain why the agency thinks it was complying with the law.” 
 
 Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), one of several lawmakers who requested the GAO review, said in a statement Monday “there are few greater examples of government waste than a $43,000 phone booth. Now we know that the purchase wasn’t just unnecessary and wasteful, but actually illegal. The American people deserve so much better than the culture of corruption, cronyism, and incompetence that is pervasive in the Trump administration and the Pruitt EPA.” 
 
 The elaborate overhaul EPA officials had to make to accommodate the privacy booth in a closet within the administrator’s suite escalated the original cost of the booth from $24,570 to $42,729, according to federal records. The Washington Post first reported the existence of the booth last September and the additional costs associated with it last month. 
 
 EPA officials, including Pruitt himself, have consistently said the administrator needs a secure area to talk to White House officials and others in the administration. Testifying before the House Energy and Commerce Committee in December, Pruitt likened the booth to a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF. 
 
 “It’s necessary for me to be able to do my job,” he told lawmakers. 
 
 No previous EPA leaders, however, have had such a setup. The agency has long maintained a SCIF on a separate floor from the administrator’s office, where officials with proper clearances can go to share information classified as secret. Pruitt’s aides have never specified what aspects of that facility might be outdated, or whether the unit now inside the administrator’s office meets the physical and technical specifications generally required for a SCIF. Even Armstrong noted Monday that the agency “did not state whether the booth has been certified” as an SCIF. 
 
 To install the booth, the EPA signed a contract last year with Acoustical Solutions, a Richmond-based company. The firm sells and installs various sound-damping and privacy products, from ceiling baffles to full-scale enclosures like the one picked by the EPA. Agency officials ordered a soundproof booth that typically is used to conduct hearing tests, but customized it at an additional expense to ensure private conversations. 
 
 “They had a lot of modifications,” Steve Snider, an acoustic sales consultant with the company, told The Post at the time. 
 
 The EPA also paid a Virginia firm $7,978 to take out closed-circuit television equipment in the room to accommodate the booth. It also released federal invoices under a Freedom of Information Act request by the left-leaning group American Oversight showing the agency hired one contractor to pour a 55-square-foot concrete block that was more than two-feet thick, at a cost of $3,470, another to install a drop ceiling for $3,361, and a third to patch and paint the room for $3,350. 
 
 Separately Monday, EPA’s inspector general released a “management alert” that detailed how Pruitt’s chief of staff Ryan Jackson had used a provision in the Safe Drinking Water Act to quickly bring on multiple political appointees and later boost their salaries. 
 
 The interim report, which stems from a broader, ongoing audit of the agency’s use of the law’s hiring authority, detailed how Jackson awarded more than a half-dozen appointees generous raises within a year of them joining the EPA. An EPA scheduling and advance director received a 72.3 percent raise last year, according to documents and agency officials, while senior counsel Sarah Greenwalt got a 67.6 percent raise. Other appointees, such as Pruitt’s speechwriter Lincoln Ferguson and senior advance associate Forrest McMurray, received at least a 25 percent salary boost in 2017. 
 
 The inspector general said Monday’s report was intended to “provide certain factual information” but “does not present any conclusions or recommendations.” 
 
 EPA officials said nearly all of the raises came after these aides had taken on additional responsibilities or had been promoted. 
 
 “Salary determinations for appointees are made by EPA’s chief of staff, White House liaison and career human resources officials,” EPA spokesman Jahan Wilcox said, who added the agency had been “responsive” to the inspector general’s inquiries. “Salary determinations are made to avoid disparities among positions of equivalent or similar responsibilities, to the extent possible.” 
 
 Pruitt and his top aides used the law’s authority to bring appointees aboard quickly to help implement the Trump administration’s agenda. Previous administrations have employed the provision in similar ways, though they do not appear to have used it as often. 
 
 Pruitt is not the only Cabinet member to come under scrutiny for redecorating his office without notifying key congressional appropriations committees in advance. 
 
 Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson has come under fire for enlisting his wife Candy’s input in upgrading his office, a move that prompted protests from the department’s chief administrative officer at the time, Helen Foster. Foster was later reassigned and has filed a whistleblower complaint. 
 
 Federal records and interviews with HUD employees indicate Candy Carson was consulted multiple times about the redecorating effort that included the purchase of a dining room set costing more than $31,000. 
 
 Last month, Carson told lawmakers when testifying about his budget he was told when he assumed his post that traditionally secretaries redecorate their offices. 
 
 “You know, I’m not really big into decorating,” Carson added. “If it were up to me, my office would probably look like a hospital waiting room. At any rate, I invited my wife in to come help me.” 
 
 Read more: 
 
 Scott Pruitt’s $25,000 soundproof phone booth? It actually cost more like $43,000. 
 
 EPA spending almost $25,000 to install a secure phone booth for Scott Pruitt 
 
 First class travel distinguishes Pruitt’s tenure 
 
 HUD Secretary Carson’s wife weighed in on redecorating effort, new emails show 

 GAO Report on Scott Pruitt's Installation of a Secure Phone Booth in His Office 
 
 In this April 16, 2018 report, the Government Accountability Office found that Environmental Protection Agency violated federal appropriations law and the Antideficiency Act by spending $43,000 to install a secure phone booth in EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt's personal office without notifying Congress first.
– It may be a fresh week for Scott Pruitt, but it's not one void of uncomfortable headlines. ABC News reports a government watchdog has determined the EPA "violated section 710” of the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act when it spent $43,000 on a "secure" phone booth for Pruitt's office. The Government Accountability Office explains that because the cost was in excess of $5,000, the EPA was required to alert Congress. Presidential appointees may make improvements to their offices up to that limit without telling Congress, and the GAO struck down the EPA's argument, reports the Washington Post: that the nearly $25,000 spent on the booth and the $18,000 in installation costs shouldn't be classified as redecoration and therefore shouldn't be beholden to that limit. "Because EPA did not comply with the notification requirement, the funds were not legally available at the time EPA incurred the obligation," the GAO found and reported in a letter to the Senate Democrats who had asked for the spending review, per the AP. The GAO says the EPA is legally required to report its violation to Congress and to President Trump, and a rep for the agency says it will get "Congress the necessary information this week." The GAO did not pass any judgment on whether the booth was a justified expense; "EPA's failure to make the necessary notification is the only subject of this opinion," per the letter.