United States Secretary of the Interior

United States Secretary of the Interior
Seal of the Department of the Interior
Flag of the Secretary of the Interior
Incumbent David Bernhardt since January 2, 2019
United States Department of the Interior
Style	Mr. Secretary (informal) The Honorable (formal)
Member of	Cabinet
Reports to	President of the United States
Seat	Washington, D.C.
Appointer	President of the United States with Senate advice and consent
Term length	No fixed term
Constituting instrument	43 U.S.C. § 1451
Formation	March 3, 1849 (1849-03-03)
First holder	Thomas Ewing
Succession	Eighth
Deputy	United States Deputy Secretary of the Interior
Salary	Executive Schedule, Level I
Website	www.doi.gov

The United States Secretary of the Interior is the head of the United States Department of the Interior. The Secretary and the Department of the Interior are responsible for the management and conservation of most federal land and natural resources, leading such agencies as the Bureau of Land Management, the United States Geological Survey, and the National Park Service. The Secretary also serves on and appoints the private citizens on the National Park Foundation Board. The Secretary is a member of the United States Cabinet and reports to the President of the United States. The U.S. Department of the Interior should not be confused with the Ministries of the Interior, as used in many other countries.

As the policies and activities of the Department of the Interior and many of its agencies have a substantial impact in the Western United States, the Secretary of the Interior has typically come from a western state; only one Secretary since 1949, Rogers Morton, was not a resident or native of a state lying west of the Mississippi River.

The current Secretary of the Interior is David Bernhardt, who held the office in an acting capacity until April 2019. He succeeded Ryan Zinke, who resigned on January 2, 2019.

Line of succession

The line of succession for the Secretary of Interior is as follows:

1. Deputy Secretary of the Interior
2. Solicitor of the Interior
3. Assistant Secretary for Policy, Management and Budget
4. Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management
5. Assistant Secretary for Water and Science
6. Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks
7. Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs
8. Director, Security, Safety, and Law Enforcement, Bureau of Reclamation
9. Central Region Director, US Geological Survey
10. Intermountain Regional Director, National Park Service
11. Region 6 (Mountain-Prairie Region) Director, US Fish and Wildlife Service
12. Colorado State Director, Bureau of Land Management
13. Regional Solicitor, Rocky Mountain Region

List of secretaries of the interior

Parties

  Whig (3)   Democratic (16)   Republican (33)

Status

  Denotes acting Secretary of the Interior

Number	Portrait	Name	State of residence	Took office	Left office	President(s)
1		Thomas Ewing	Ohio	March 8, 1849	July 22, 1850		Zachary Taylor
							Millard Fillmore
2		Thomas M. T. McKennan	Pennsylvania	August 15, 1850	August 26, 1850
3		Alexander H. H. Stuart	Virginia	September 14, 1850	March 7, 1853
4		Robert McClelland	Michigan	March 8, 1853	March 9, 1857		Franklin Pierce
5		Jacob Thompson	Mississippi	March 10, 1857	January 8, 1861		James Buchanan
6		Caleb B. Smith	Indiana	March 5, 1861	December 31, 1862		Abraham Lincoln
7		John P. Usher	Indiana	January 1, 1863	May 15, 1865		Abraham Lincoln Andrew Johnson
8		James Harlan	Iowa	May 16, 1865	August 31, 1866		Andrew Johnson
9		Orville H. Browning	Illinois	September 1, 1866	March 4, 1869		Andrew Johnson
10		Jacob D. Cox	Ohio	March 5, 1869	October 31, 1870		Ulysses S. Grant
11		Columbus Delano	Ohio	November 1, 1870	September 30, 1875
12		Zachariah Chandler	Michigan	October 19, 1875	March 11, 1877
13		Carl Schurz	Missouri	March 12, 1877	March 7, 1881		Rutherford B. Hayes
14		Samuel J. Kirkwood	Iowa	March 8, 1881	April 17, 1882		James A. Garfield
							Chester A. Arthur
15		Henry M. Teller	Colorado	April 18, 1882	March 3, 1885
16		Lucius Q. C. Lamar II	Mississippi	March 6, 1885	January 10, 1888		Grover Cleveland
17		William F. Vilas	Wisconsin	January 16, 1888	March 6, 1889
18		John W. Noble	Missouri	March 7, 1889	March 6, 1893		Benjamin Harrison
19		Hoke Smith	Georgia	March 6, 1893	September 1, 1896		Grover Cleveland
20		David R. Francis	Missouri	September 3, 1896	March 5, 1897
21		Cornelius N. Bliss	New York	March 6, 1897	February 19, 1899		William McKinley
22		Ethan A. Hitchcock	Missouri	February 20, 1899	March 4, 1907
							Theodore Roosevelt
23		James R. Garfield	Ohio	March 5, 1907	March 4, 1909
24		Richard A. Ballinger	Washington	March 6, 1909	March 12, 1911		William Howard Taft
25		Walter L. Fisher	Illinois	March 13, 1911	March 5, 1913
26		Franklin K. Lane	California	March 6, 1913	February 29, 1920		Woodrow Wilson
–		Alexander T. Vogelsang Acting	California	February 29, 1920	March 13, 1920
27		John B. Payne	Illinois	March 15, 1920	March 4, 1921
28		Albert B. Fall	New Mexico	March 5, 1921	March 4, 1923		Warren G. Harding
29		Hubert Work	Colorado	March 5, 1923	July 24, 1928
							Calvin Coolidge
30		Roy O. West	Illinois	July 25, 1928	March 4, 1929
31		Ray Lyman Wilbur	California	March 5, 1929	March 4, 1933		Herbert Hoover
32		Harold L. Ickes	Illinois	March 4, 1933	February 15, 1946		Franklin D. Roosevelt
							Harry S. Truman
–		Oscar L. Chapman Acting	Colorado	February 15, 1946	March 18, 1946
33		Julius A. Krug	Wisconsin	March 18, 1946	December 1, 1949
34		Oscar L. Chapman	Colorado	December 1, 1949	January 20, 1953
35		Douglas McKay	Oregon	January 21, 1953	April 15, 1956		Dwight D. Eisenhower
–		Clarence A. Davis Acting	Nebraska	April 15, 1956	June 8, 1956
36		Fred A. Seaton	Nebraska	June 8, 1956	January 20, 1961
37		Stewart L. Udall	Arizona	January 21, 1961	January 20, 1969		John F. Kennedy
							Lyndon B. Johnson
38		Walter J. Hickel	Alaska	January 24, 1969	November 25, 1970		Richard Nixon
–		Fred J. Russell Acting	California	November 25, 1970	January 29, 1971
39		Rogers C. B. Morton	Maryland	January 29, 1971	April 30, 1975
							Gerald Ford
–		D. Kent Frizzell Acting	Kansas	April 30, 1975	June 12, 1975
40		Stanley K. Hathaway	Wyoming	June 12, 1975	October 9, 1975
–		D. Kent Frizzell Acting	Kansas	October 9, 1975	October 17, 1975
41		Thomas S. Kleppe	North Dakota	October 17, 1975	January 20, 1977
–		Alfred G. Albert Acting		January 20, 1977	January 23, 1977		Jimmy Carter
42		Cecil D. Andrus	Idaho	January 23, 1977	January 20, 1981
43		James G. Watt	Colorado	January 23, 1981	November 8, 1983		Ronald Reagan
–		J. J. Simmons III Acting	New Jersey	November 8, 1983	November 18, 1983
44		William P. Clark	California	November 18, 1983	February 7, 1985
45		Donald P. Hodel	Virginia	February 8, 1985	January 20, 1989
–		Earl E. Gjelde Acting	Virginia	January 20, 1989	February 3, 1989		George H. W. Bush
46		Manuel Lujan Jr.	New Mexico	February 3, 1989	January 20, 1993
47		Bruce E. Babbitt	Arizona	January 22, 1993	January 2, 2001		Bill Clinton
–		Thomas N. Slonaker Acting	Arizona	January 2, 2001	January 31, 2001
							George W. Bush
48		Gale A. Norton	Colorado	January 31, 2001	March 31, 2006
–		Lynn Scarlett Acting	California	April 1, 2006	May 26, 2006
49		Dirk Kempthorne	Idaho	May 29, 2006	January 19, 2009
-		Lynn Scarlett Acting	California	January 19, 2009	January 20, 2009
							Barack Obama
50		Ken Salazar	Colorado	January 20, 2009	April 12, 2013
51		Sally Jewell	Washington	April 12, 2013	January 20, 2017
–		Kevin Haugrud Acting		January 20, 2017	March 1, 2017		Donald Trump
52		Ryan Zinke	Montana	March 1, 2017	January 2, 2019
53		David Bernhardt	Virginia	January 2, 2019	April 11, 2019
				April 11, 2019	Incumbent

Living former secretaries of the interior

See also: List of living former members of the United States Cabinet

The former flag of the United States Secretary of the Interior, which was used from 1917 to 1934

As of December 2020, eight former secretaries of the interior are alive (with all secretaries that have served since 1993 still living), the oldest being Donald P. Hodel (served 1985–1989, born 1935). The most recent to die was Manuel Lujan Jr. (served 1989–1993, born 1928), on April 25, 2019. He was also the most recently serving secretary to die.

Name	Term of office	Date of birth (and age)
James G. Watt	1981–1983	(1938-01-31) January 31, 1938
Donald P. Hodel	1985–1989	(1935-05-23) May 23, 1935
Bruce E. Babbitt	1993–2001	(1938-06-27) June 27, 1938
Gale A. Norton	2001–2006	(1954-03-11) March 11, 1954
Dirk Kempthorne	2006–2009	(1951-10-29) October 29, 1951
Ken Salazar	2009–2013	(1955-03-02) March 2, 1955
Sally Jewell	2013–2017	(1956-02-21) February 21, 1956
Ryan Zinke	2017–2019	(1961-11-01) November 1, 1961

External links

• Official website
• List of Secretaries of the Interior (worldstatesmen.org)
• The Department of Everything Else: Highlights of Interior History (1989)

U.S. order of precedence (ceremonial)
Preceded by William Barr	Order of Precedence of the United States as Secretary of the Interior	Succeeded by Sonny Perdue as Secretary of Agriculture
U.S. presidential line of succession
Preceded by Attorney General William Barr	8th in line	Succeeded by Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue