So, Scott Pruitt spent thousands of government dollars on a junket to Morocco during which he promoted the export of natural gas…an activity which has nothing to do with the agency he heads. Funnily enough the agency to protect the environment does not lobby for natural gas export.

He’s also doing his best to conceal nearly everything about it.

Newly released calendars for one of the most controversial trips of Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s tenure were largely blacked out before being shared with ABC News.

The 47-hour journey in Morocco was already drawing congressional scrutiny and criticism from outside groups because of the lack transparency over why Pruitt was in the country and what he was doing while he was there.

In Morocco, he spent at least a portion of his time promoting exports for U.S. energy firms. Conservative congressional estimates put the cost of the trip at more than $40,000, and because of travel snags, Pruitt and his aides spent two days in Paris at high-end hotels.

Or because of “travel snags.” Oh, oh, the plane is dusty, we have to stay in Paris for a couple of days, what a shame.

Pruitt did not publicly announce he was going ahead of time, did not bring reporters along, and when he finally released copies of his itinerary in response to Freedom of Information requests from ABC News and other news organizations, the bulk of the schedule was blacked out.

The bulk of the schedule was blacked out. How does he even justify that? The EPA is not the CIA; where does he get off refusing to tell us what he did in Morocco? Why would it be secret?

“The substantial redaction of calendars from his trip to Morocco, in which he apparently spent substantial taxpayer money to work on an issue that could benefit donors and those with ties to him, seems like just the latest example of the inappropriate secrecy he has brought to every aspect of his job,” Noah Bookbinder, the executive director of the nonpartisan watchdog Citizens for Responsible Ethics in Washington, said in a statement.

It’s not a secret agency. It’s not an agency that is supposed to keep secrets*.

What is known about Pruitt’s trip to Morocco last December comes from a press statement he released as he departed to fly back to D.C. According to the EPA press release, he discussed U.S. environmental priorities and the U.S.-Morocco Free Trade Agreement with Moroccan leaders and, to the surprise of some, promoted benefit of liquid natural gas imports in Morocco.

At the time of the trip, the only U.S. company that exported liquid natural gas was represented by a top Washington lobbyist who arranged $50-a-night housing for Pruitt when he first moved to town. The company, Cheniere, and the lobbyist, Steven Hart, both told ABC News they did not ask Pruitt to promote the exports in Morocco.

Oh, thank god, that’s all right then.

Sleaze piled on sleaze.

The massive redactions were justified according to team Pruitt by the “deliberative process privilege” allowed under the Freedom of Information Act.

Typically, that’s an exception used to avoid releasing the details of internal policy discussions before they are finalized, so as to prevent confusing the public, according to the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press website.

The EPA cites the exemption repeatedly to justify deletions throughout the 350 pages of schedules the EPA released this week, including his activities on New Year’s Day.

Whitehouse wrote in a letter earlier this month that he has reviewed copies of Pruitt’s schedule that show he traveled with his family to the Rose Bowl and Disneyland during that time.

Deliberating, were they? Engaging in the deliberative process while they watched the football? The whole family deliberating on EPA matters at Disneyland?

Adam Marshall, an attorney with the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press, said the use of the Deliberative Process Privilege is problematic in this case because previous court cases have said it can’t be used to redact purely factual information like the date, time, or who attended a meeting.

Marshall called it the “withhold it because you want to” exemption because agencies routinely overuse it.

“We know from past experiences that [the exemption is] used to withhold embarrassing and politically inconvenient information from the public,” he said in an interview with ABC News.

Which covers pretty much everything Scott Pruitt does.

*Correction, courtesy of iknklast: “I learned during my tenure with Oklahoma Department of Envrionmental Quality, which works closely with the EPA, that trade secrets are to be protected. If a company wishes to poison us with something, they declare it a trade secret, and it won’t show up in the files by name…”