(Bloomberg) -- Congressional Republicans are intensifying their investigation into President Joe Biden’s climate diplomacy, accusing the White House of doing an end-run around a law requiring Senate confirmation of special envoys.

The decision to make John Podesta the country’s chief climate diplomat even though he will remain at the White House and is taking on the duties of a special presidential envoy is a “flagrant attempt to evade” the law, House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer said in a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

At issue is a one-year-old mandate for Senate confirmation of anyone serving as a special envoy or in another position performing similar functions. The requirement never applied to former Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, because he was appointed before it was enacted. Now that Podesta has taken on Kerry’s duties, Comer said, “it is unclear to what extent he will retain the same powers” and the specific details of his relationship with the State Department’s climate envoy office. 

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The committee is requesting documents that could shed light on Podesta’s role and responsibilities as well as changes in the office’s organization. The effort underscores deep Republican skepticism regarding the work of the US climate envoy, who’s responsible for representing the country in negotiations over Paris Agreement carbon-cutting targets and other multilateral efforts to avert global warming.

Podesta, a Democratic strategist and White House veteran who chaired Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, has been working to shepherd the Biden administration’s implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act.

The oversight committee had already been looking into the climate envoy office’s work under Kerry, who stepped down last week. The panel’s newest salvo follows a similar missive last week from the head of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, and Shelley Moore Capito, the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

Representatives of the State Department and the White House did not respond to request for comment on that letter.

Podesta, now formally the senior adviser to the president for international climate policy, is remaining at the White House. The Office of the Special Presidential Envoy for Climate is set to continue operating, reporting to the deputy secretary of State for management and resources.

Read More: John Podesta to Replace Kerry as Top US Climate Diplomat 

In his letter to Blinken, Comer said that arrangement could confound future congressional scrutiny of Podesta’s work: “The committee has concerns that the State Department and the White House will deliberately complicate future congressional oversight requests on the grounds that Mr. Podesta is simultaneously a White House employee and a State Department leader.” 

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