" To serve in the Trump administration is to deserve hazard pay, and lately that’s especially true of Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke.

The green-industrial complex claimed Scott Pruitt’s scalp last month, ginning up a storm of ethics allegations that forced his resignation as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Now it has shifted focus to Mr. Zinke. But it’s hitting walls. Mr. Zinke isn’t giving his detractors easy opportunities. He has aides who know and follow the rules, and backing in the White House and in Congress.

Not that the incoming is pleasant. Few movements are better funded and coordinated or more messianic than the environmental left. They despise a Trump team that is correcting decades of backward energy and environmental schemes and are working furiously to bring down the reformers. Unlike green groups of 20 years ago, which focused on policy, today’s effort is focused almost entirely on personal destruction.

Mr. Zinke’s antagonists include the usual big-dollar organizations, like the Natural Resources Defense Council, many of which are now staffed or run by former Obama officials; self-described watchdog groups like the Western Values Project, that are closely tied to major environmental and labor groups; and congressional allies such as Democratic Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona, who call daily for investigations. The coalition produces an assembly line of allegations, which the mainstream media dutifully pass along.

Their problem is that they can’t find any real stink with Mr. Zinke. Mr. Pruitt was hit with an array of allegations, many nonsensical, but what tipped the scale against him were those in which he seemed to be using his position for gain or wasting taxpayer dollars. The critics have tried desperately to do the same to Mr. Zinke, with no luck.

One claim was that he secretly arranged a Puerto Rico contract for an energy firm from Whitefish, Mont., his hometown. The Interior Department’s Office of Inspector General tells me it never opened an investigation, and even Democrats have dropped it in embarrassment.

Mr. Zinke’s foes more recently claimed he has misused his office to promote a land development in Whitefish. But the story involves a foundation from which Mr. Zinke resigned upon becoming secretary, and a project that has been on the table for ages.

The groups have also tried to go after him on spending, including three chartered flights. But the inspector general found Mr. Zinke had followed “relevant law, policy, rules and regulations.” It also found all the trips were “reasonable,” save one—and Mr. Zinke’s staff wasn’t to blame since it received prior approval from ethics officials for every flight. Then there has been the attempt to claim he violated the Hatch Act by attending political events while out on official duties. The U.S. Office of Special Counsel (a permanent government body that monitors federal personnel issues) in May said Mr. Zinke had done everything legally. Every “scandal” is of this type; lots of smoke, but never any fire.

Mr. Zinke has an added asset in Deputy Secretary David Bernhardt, who worked at Interior during the George W. Bush administration, where he went through the ethics rodeo. Mr. Bernhardt is hiring an unprecedented number of new ethics officials, including in April two ethics gurus, Scott de la Vega and Heather Gottry, who each bring decades of expertise. The goal is not only to give the political team the best guidance, but to ensure better compliance across Interior’s 70,000 employees.

One final point in Mr. Zinke’s favor: He has support within the administration. One recently departed White House official tells me this is in large part because the interior secretary (unlike Mr. Pruitt) is the “consummate team player,” constantly engaged in dialogue with White House staff, and in particular willing to take direction on how to handle questions and situations.

And there is respect—internally, in Congress, and at the state level—for his reform program, which has been sweeping. The department has been leading the way on swifter, smarter timelines for environmental analyses and permitting. It is tackling the failed Endangered Species Act, jump-starting oil and gas development on federal lands, making sure public lands are once again for “public use” by all, and working to cut an enormous maintenance backlog in the national parks.

All of this is why he will continue as the environmental left’s top target—they despise any plan that envisions our public lands for “the benefit and enjoyment of the people” ( Teddy Roosevelt’s words at Yellowstone). Expect to see more headlines suggesting Mr. Zinke is corrupt. But know that those headlines don’t come via fact or reason or policy debate. They come out of a known take-down strategy from the left—and one to which Mr. Zinke and his team are on guard. "

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