Gov. Nathan Deal played matchmaker to arrange the hiring of Chip Rogers last year to a six-figure job at Georgia Public Broadcasting. His office's fingerprints were all over Rogers' departure, too.
As the state Senate majority leader, Rogers was once one of the most influential Republicans in Georgia until he stepped down in December 2012 to take what he described as a "dream job" with a taxpayer-funded salary of $150,000. He and GPB parted ways last week after little more than a year.
Emails obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution through an Open Records Act request show that Chris Riley, the governor's chief of staff, was alerted on April 17 that Rogers held an outside job as a lobbyist for the Asian American Hotel Owners Association.
“I am not sure of the validity of the information so it will need to be verified but I thought Teya should be made aware,” a reference to GPB president Teya Ryan, Riley wrote in an email to Bart Gobeil, the state’s chief operating officer.
Rogers' work with the hotel group was well-known in political circles, and the AJC reported in July 2012 that he was the "public face" of the organization. Deal spokesman Brian Robinson said Thursday that the anonymous tip that Riley received last week was the first time Deal's top aides learned of it.
“We acted immediately to inform GPB once we learned of it,” Robinson said.
Gobeil’s calendar showed he talked with Ryan on April 17, and he wrote Riley that he “brought this to her attention” and that she will “review and take immediate appropriate action.”
Ryan and other GPB executives have declined repeated requests for comment, and Deal has said it was a “personnel matter” that he couldn’t speak about.
Democrats have criticized Deal for hiring Rogers in the first place and then arranging his ouster in an election year. Rogers, for his part, said in a statement to the AJC that he was proud of his work at GPB.
“I look forward to my next challenge,” he said, “and wish the best for everyone at GPB.”
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