Transparency
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</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">promoted to primary on <b>trumplandia trangressions </b>(white house visitor logs) overturn BO who emphasized openness</span>
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</span></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>see two 320</b></span></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">webpages agw pulled</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This node created in honor of Sen Frank Lauterberg, who pushed for RTK</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> neglected? opposite of corruption?</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Systems Theory eg Macy and Brown says that energy and info flows through systems; this node is about all that promotes it; its opposite is more or less CORRUPTION</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> trust civ soc</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">FOIA intent was to force the gov't to disclose info, tho have been evil/perverted by corps and pol-ops to silence academics</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> bak 1119</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">CU 501C3 AND C4 HIDE $ = BUFFER</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> =</font></p><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">an 520</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/05/trump-administrations-serial-ig-purges-fuel-calls-for-anti-corruption-provisions-in-next-covid-19-package/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;">https://www.alternet.org/2020/05/trump-administrations-serial-ig-purges-fuel-calls-for-anti-corruption-provisions-in-next-covid-19-package/</a></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/04/trump-white-house-ignores-bipartisan-group-of-senators-demanding-explanation-for-firing-of-former-intelligence-ig/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;">https://www.alternet.org/2020/04/trump-white-house-ignores-bipartisan-group-of-senators-demanding-explanation-for-firing-of-former-intelligence-ig/</a></font></div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" /><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">no lnx</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div><b>Trump White House ignores bipartisan group of senators demanding explanation for firing of former intelligence IG</b></div></div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html</font></a></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">EPA</a>) used the cover of Super Tuesday to put out an update to its <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-rules-science-polluters-2641315671.html?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1" target="self" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">plans to limit scientific research</a> in its decision-making on Tuesday evening, as the mass media world had its eyes focused on the election results trickling in.</b></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body css-listicle-body-2645395622" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin-top: -15px; line-height: 1.5;"><div class="body-description" style="clear: both;"><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-basename="particle-1" data-href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1" data-id="1" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem1"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The proposal, called <a href="https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2020-03/documents/supplemental_notice_of_strengthening_transparency_in_regulatory_science.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science</a>, is part of the agency's ongoing push to rewrite "the foundation on which public health and environmental rules are crafted," as <a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/trump-administration-expands-reach-epa-secret-science-proposal" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">E&E News</a> reported.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/04/super-tuesday-news-dump-epa-expands-rule-limiting-science-agency-can-use-make-public" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">Common Dreams</a> reported, the timing of the release was curious. In a <a href="https://twitter.com/rebleber/status/1234996734578683904" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">tweet</a>, Rebecca Leber from Mother Jones wrote, "an incredible news dump by EPA this evening. After delays, EPA just moved forward its most controversial proposal of the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">Trump</a> administration, limiting <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/science/" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">science</a> and medical data that can be used by the agency. Still far from a final rule but inching closer."</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-basename="particle-2" data-href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html?rebelltitem=2#rebelltitem2" data-id="2" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem2"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Experts say the move, which would restrict the type of research that can be considered in public health and environmental regulations, is one of the government's most far-reaching restrictions on science, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/climate/trump-science-epa.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The New York Times</a>.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The proposal, which was first put forth in <b>April 2018 by former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt,</b> looked to exclude research where all the underlying data was not publicly available, even if that meant data was not shared because it would have violated medical privacy laws.<b> The so-called "secret science</b>" proposal received more than 600,000 comments during the public comment period. Most of them were critical of a proposal that would stop the agency from considering landmark public health research, according to <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/485811-epa-revamp-of-secret-science-rule-will-still-limit-research" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The Hill</a>. For example, under the proposal, the EPA would downplay studies that "definitively linked <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">air pollution</a> to premature deaths but relied on the personal health information of thousands of study subjects who had been guaranteed confidentiality," according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/climate/trump-science-epa.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The New York Times</a>.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-basename="particle-3" data-href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html?rebelltitem=3#rebelltitem3" data-id="3" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem3"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"They're putting in nonscientific criteria to decide what science the agency can use," said Andrew Rosenberg, director of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/climate/trump-science-epa.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The New York Times</a> reported. "Now the most important thing is whether the data is public, not the strength of the scientific evidence."</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The new proposal makes a slight alteration. It would not flatly reject studies without publicly available information. Instead, it would create a tiered-system and give lower priority to studies where some of the data, even sensitive medical data, is not made public, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/climate/trump-science-epa.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The New York Times</a>.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-basename="particle-4" data-href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html?rebelltitem=4#rebelltitem4" data-id="4" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem4"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"In the midst of a public health crisis, Americans deserve a government that relies on the best available science to protect everyone against harm. This proposal does the opposite," said Gina McCarthy, former EPA administrator and now president and CEO of the Natural Resources Defense Council, in a <a href="https://www.nrdc.org/media/2020/200304" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">statement</a>.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Now is not the time to play games with critical medical research that underpins every rule designed to protect us from harmful pollution in our air and in our water," <b>McCarthy </b>added. "This move is even more egregious than the last proposal, which the administration's own hand-picked scientists criticized."</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-basename="particle-5" data-href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-limits-science-public-health-2645395622.html?rebelltitem=5#rebelltitem5" data-id="5" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem5"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The proposal seems to be in lockstep with the administration's systematic efforts to dismantle environmental regulations and to finalize the rollbacks before this year's election. The effort to dilute scientific-research is particularly beneficial to the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fossil-fuels" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">fossil fuel</a> industry, which is often hampered by studies about the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-crisis" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">climate crisis</a>, air pollution or the safety of drinking water, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/climate/trump-science-epa.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">The New York Times</a> reported.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"These additions and clarifications to the proposed rule will ensure that the science supporting the agency's decisions is transparent and available for independent validation while still maintaining protection of confidential and personally identifiable information," said Andrew Wheeler, the EPA's administrator, as <a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/trump-administration-expands-reach-epa-secret-science-proposal" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">E&E News</a> reported.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">However, observers have a much different take on the intent of the rule.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"It's increasing the damage of the proposed rule," said Betsy Southerland, former director of EPA's Office of Science and Technology and a member of the Environmental Protection Network, as <a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/trump-administration-expands-reach-epa-secret-science-proposal" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; line-height: 1.5;">E&E News</a> reported.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Number 1, it expands the scope of the rule, and number 2, by no means does it demonstrate they have a legal authority to do this rulemaking.</font></p></div></div></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">aha: authoritarian deadly in pandemic</font></p><div>
</div><div><div class="mag-post-box hentry" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 15px; width: 374.545px; overflow: hidden; display: table; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(236, 236, 236); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="magcat-detail" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><h3 class="magcat-titlte entry-title" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; letter-spacing: 1px;"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/experts-accuse-cdc-of-withholding-crucial-information-about-the-coronavirus-from-doctors/" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; display: block; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 1.4;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">experts accuse CDC of withholding ‘crucial’ information about the coronavirus from doctors</font></a></h3><div class="grid-post-box-meta mag-meta" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 7px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: right;"><span class="author-italic author vcard" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b><a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/igor-derysh/" title="Posts by Igor Derysh" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Igor Derysh</a> / <a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/salon/" title="Posts by Salon " class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Salon</a></b></font></span></div></div></div><div class="mag-post-box hentry" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 374.545px; overflow: hidden; display: table; border-bottom: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="magcat-thumb" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 20px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; position: relative; transition: opacity 0.3s ease 0s;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a class="penci-image-holder penci-lazy small-fix-size" href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/the-stunning-way-trump-made-a-once-toxic-intel-nominee-suddenly-seem-acceptable/" title="The stunning way Trump made a once-toxic intel nominee suddenly seem acceptable" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; position: relative; width: 120px; background: url(" https="https" www.alternet.org="www.alternet.org" wp-content="wp-content" uploads="uploads" house-judiciary-780x516.jpg="House-Judiciary-780x516.jpg" center="center" cover="cover" no-repeat="no-repeat" rgb="rgb" display="display" inline-block="inline-block" vertical-align="vertical-align" top="top" overflow="overflow" hidden="hidden" /></font></div></div></div><div><a class="penci-image-holder penci-lazy small-fix-size" href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/the-stunning-way-trump-made-a-once-toxic-intel-nominee-suddenly-seem-acceptable/" title="The stunning way Trump made a once-toxic intel nominee suddenly seem acceptable" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; position: relative; width: 120px; background: url(" https="https" www.alternet.org="www.alternet.org" wp-content="wp-content" uploads="uploads" house-judiciary-780x516.jpg="House-Judiciary-780x516.jpg" center="center" cover="cover" no-repeat="no-repeat" rgb="rgb" display="display" inline-block="inline-block" vertical-align="vertical-align" top="top" overflow="overflow" hidden="hidden"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: currentcolor none medium; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></font></a></div><div><div class="mag-header" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 19px; padding: 0px; position: relative; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><h3 class="magcat-titlte entry-title" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; letter-spacing: 1px;"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/absolutely-outrageous-white-house-bars-press-from-filming-or-recording-coronavirus-briefing/" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; display: block; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 1.4;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Absolutely outrageous’: White House bars press from filming or recording coronavirus briefing</font></a></h3><div class="grid-post-box-meta mag-meta" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 7px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><span class="author-italic author vcard" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/jake-johnson/" title="Posts by Jake Johnson" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Jake Johnson</a> / <a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/common-dreams/" title="Posts by Common Dreams" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Common Dreams</a></font></span></div></div><div class="mag-excerpt entry-content" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"We need transparency. Instead we are getting this."</font></p></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: currentcolor none medium; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></font></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">transparency</font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">koch v ca</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">https://www.exposedbycmd.org/</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><a href="https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2020/01/10/koch-funds-groups-supporting-lawsuit-against-donor-transparency/">https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2020/01/10/koch-funds-groups-supporting-lawsuit-against-donor-transparency/</a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">vs corruption/ failed state cf conflict mineral dodd-frank</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/04/why-natural-resources-are-a-curse-on-developing-countries-and-how-to-fix-it/256508/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/04/why-natural-resources-are-a-curse-on-developing-countries-and-how-to-fix-it/256508/</font></a></p><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/11/inside-the-secret-deep-state-army-thats-quietly-uncovering-trumps-corruption/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;">https://www.alternet.org/2019/11/inside-the-secret-deep-state-army-thats-quietly-uncovering-trumps-corruption/</a></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Inside the secret ‘deep state’ army that’s quietly uncovering Trump’s corruption</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Written by Tom Buerkle / DC Report, Raw Story November 4, 2019</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Our government’s Inspectors General pose one of the biggest threats to Donald Trump’s presidency. The IGs’ unique status as independent watchdogs that report both to their own agencies and to Congress make them a powerful tool to root out presidential abuse, fraud and corruption.</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Intelligence Community Inspector General triggered the House impeachment investigation by bringing forth the anonymous whistleblower complaint revealing that Trump pressured Ukraine’s new leader to publicly declare Kyiv was digging dirt on Joe Biden.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Multiple IG inquiries now bear down on Trump’s maladministration of our government, each gathering facts about Team Trump’s disregard for the rule of law.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Abuse of asylum seekers on our southern border is in the sights of the Department of Homeland Security’s IG. In a July report, he called on officials to take immediate action to alleviate “dangerous overcrowding and prolonged detention of children and adults” in the Rio Grande Valley.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Team Trump’s conduct makes clear they want to suppress or distract attention from critical inspector general reports</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The number of people border patrol agents apprehended there more than doubled to 223,000 from October 2018 and May 2019, compared with the same period a year earlier.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">‘Egregious Violations’ and Little Discipline</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>A separate report the previous month cited “egregious violations” of standards at Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities in California and New Jersey. Yet another reported on a lack of oversight of misconduct and discipline.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In an August report, the Pentagon’s inspector general warned that without American troops in Syria the combined forces of Iraq’s army and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces would be “unable to sustain long-term operations against ISIS militants” at a time when that Islamic group was increasing its attacks in the region.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">That didn’t stop commander-in-chief Trump from abruptly tweeting a major change in Mideast policy on Oct, 7 that endangered both our national security and our elite troops in northern Syria. Trump tweeted without notifying the generals and blindsided even White House national security officials.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Turkey’s invasion forced our soldiers to flee so quickly that they left half-eaten meals, prompting Russian state television to mock our troops. American warplanes had to bomb our own nearby munitions dumps to keep the weapons from hostile hands.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Fierce criticism from Republicans led Trump to retreat and use American forces to prevent ISIS from gaining control of Syrian oil fields and perhaps seize them, which would be a crime under international law.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Curious Cloud Contract</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The Defense Department Acting IG is investigating the Pentagon’s awarding of a $10 billion cloud computing contract to Microsoft. Amazon had long been considered the favorite to win the business because it provides cloud services to the CIA. Trump has long attacked Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos, accusing his Washington Post of spreading fake news.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Even Trump’s trade wars are getting close scrutiny. The Commerce Department’s IG office late last month warned Secretary Wilbur Ross that lax procedures mean that favored companies and industries could improperly influence department officials to win exemptions from the Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs. And only days earlier IG Peggy Gustafson told Ross she lacked the staff to properly vet the huge increase in foreign investments into our country that the Trump administration is demanding to blunt China.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Team Trump’s conduct makes clear they want to suppress or distract attention from critical IG reports or even just making documents available to Congressional investigators. Last April Trump ordered his entire administration to largely ignore Congressional oversight, a core function of Congress under our Constitution’s system of checks and balances.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Inspectors General United</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">After Trump’s Justice Department tried to silence the Ukraine whistleblower in October, 67 of the 73 IGs rallied to the whistleblower’s defense.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel had tried to silence the intelligence whistleblower, whose complaint triggered the impeachment inquiry. That drew a sharp rebuke from the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The IG’s letter warned that such suppression efforts “could seriously undermine the critical role whistleblowers play in coming forward to report waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Brave Bureaucrats</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Significantly, the first of 67 signatures on the Oct. 22 letter came from the Justice Department’s own IG, Michael Horowitz.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">That united public defense was an act of “bureaucratic bravery,” John Hudak, deputy director of the Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings Institution, told DCReport.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">There’s no small irony in the activism of the IGs. Congress created these watchdogs in all cabinet departments and federal entities under a 1978 law, part of a wave of clean government legislation passed after the Watergate scandal forced Richard Nixon to resign rather than face impeachment.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The inspectors general are unlikely to thwart administration policy, at least in the short run.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">To Trump they provide a convenient foil, embodying what he claims is a “deep state” of unelected bureaucrats, a claim that fuels conspiracy theorists and fringe elements who claim our federal government is a criminal organization.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">And they can’t force change, but their reports can motivate Congress and the White House to act. The Office of Personnel Management IG’s calls for tighter data security went unheeded until 2015, when during the Obama administration OPM revealed that suspected Chinese hackers had stolen sensitive information including Social Security numbers of nearly 20 million people who applied for government background clearances.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">IG Budget Cuts</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">IGs have a unique independent status, reporting both to their executive agencies as well as to Congress. They also deliver real value, generating $14 in cost savings and fraud recoveries for every dollar they spent in fiscal 2018. That gives them clout and allies on both sides of the political divide.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Team Trump has cut IG budgets, as did Obama.</b> They declined more than 7 percent over six years, to $2.5 billion in fiscal 2018, even as overall federal spending rose by more than 16 percent, to $4.1 trillion. That may explain why IG induced savings and recoveries fell to $36.2 billion, down 22% from $46.3 billion.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Today nine cabinet departments lack a Senate-confirmed IG, including the CIA, the Pentagon, Education, and Health and Human Services. A president who knows that IGs dig up facts which he has tried to keep hidden is, predictably, in no hurry to plug that gap.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small;">
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</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/elizabeth-warren-calls-out-mark-zuckerberg-over-new-facebook-ad-policies-after-his-meeting-with-trump-the-public-deserves-to-know/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/elizabeth-warren-calls-out-mark-zuckerberg-over-new-facebook-ad-policies-after-his-meeting-with-trump-the-public-deserves-to-know/</a></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">aha-let intel is least transparent, and whistleblowers most at isk but most needed</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">an 919</font></p><p /><div class="mag-post-box hentry" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 374.545px; overflow: hidden; display: table; border-bottom: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="magcat-thumb" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 20px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; position: relative; transition: opacity 0.3s ease 0s;"><div class="mag-post-box hentry" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 15px; width: 374.545px; overflow: hidden; display: table; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(236, 236, 236); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="magcat-detail" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><h3 class="magcat-titlte entry-title" open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-style="font-style" normal="normal" letter-spacing="letter-spacing" px="px" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/intelligence-whistleblowers-often-pay-a-severe-price/" open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-weight="font-weight" bold="bold" letter-spacing="letter-spacing" px="px" line-height="line-height" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; display: block;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Intelligence whistleblowers often pay a severe price</font></a></h3><div class="grid-post-box-meta mag-meta" style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 7px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><span class="author-italic author vcard" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/the-conversation/" title="Posts by The Conversation" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Conversation</font></a></span></div></div></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/warren-climate-risk-disclosure-act-2640576122.html"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.ecowatch.com/warren-climate-risk-disclosure-act-2640576122.html</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/green-new-deal" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">Green New Deal</a> has been the focal point of the climate debate among the Democratic presidential candidates. Less publicized is the Climate Risk Disclosure Act, a proposal from Senator and presidential contender Elizabeth Warren, that seeks to frame <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">climate change</a> as a threat to the public markets.</font></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><b style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The idea: </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">force companies to publicly disclose how their valuation would fare should climate change continue </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">versus how they would do should temperature rise be capped at 1.5 degrees Celsius higher than pre-industrial levels, the benchmark outlined in the </span><a href="https://climateactiontracker.org/methodology/paris-temperature-goal/" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">Paris agreement</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">.</span></b></font></p><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-id="1" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem1"><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>"The Climate Risk Disclosure Act</b> empowers investors to make smart decisions about where to invest their money by requiring that public companies be straight about how climate change and related policies will affect their bottom lines," said Sen. Warren in an exclusive statement sent to Cheddar. "Shareholders weighing this new information will compel big companies to speed up the transition to a clean energy economy, reducing the odds of an environmental and financial disaster without spending a dime of taxpayer money."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">First proposed in 2018, and reintroduced with changes earlier this summer, Warren's bill would use the Securities and Exchange Commission to force publicly-traded companies to confront their own position within the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-crisis" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">climate crisis</a> — and share that information with investors. The law, the Senator's office <a href="https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/The%20Climate%20Risk%20Disclosure%20Act%20of%202019%20-%20One%20Pager.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">explains</a>, would also have companies reveal their direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions, share the total fossil fuel assets they own or manage, and outline their climate change risk management strategies.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It's certainly not the only climate proposal from the Massachusetts senator, but the Climate Risk Disclosure Act does appear fundamentally Warren-esque in its hope to use regulatory agencies — in this case, the SEC — to push the free market toward a less environmentally-destructive future.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Notably, the legislation was co-sponsored by several <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/2075/cosponsors" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">other presidential hopefuls</a>, including Sen. Kamala Harris, Sen. Cory Booker, and Sen. Amy Klobuchar. It has also won the endorsement of sustainability advocacy organizations, including the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (Ceres) and the U.S. Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investment (US SIF).</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Rep. Sean Casten (D-Ill.) introduced the bill in the House, where it just <a href="https://casten.house.gov/media/press-releases/casten-warren-climate-risk-disclosure-act-passes-house-financial-services" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">passed</a> the House Financial Services Committee.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Public corporations must take responsibility for the large financial risks posed by the impacts of climate change, while embracing the economic opportunity of being global leaders in developing a clean energy economy," said Casten in a statement to Cheddar. "Our bill utilizes market mechanisms to incentivize climate action by ensuring that corporations disclose the risks posed by climate action to the benefit of their shareholders and the public."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-id="2" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem2" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This is not the first time an idea like this has come up. As early as 2007, state officials, investor advocates, and climate groups — including Ceres, Friends of the Earth, and Environmental Defense — had begun pushing the SEC to issue guidance as to how companies should disclose risks related to climate change.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Companies' financial condition increasingly depends upon their ability to avoid climate risk and to capitalize on new business opportunities by responding to the changing physical and regulatory environment," they <a href="https://www.sec.gov/rules/petitions/2007/petn4-547.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">wrote</a> in a letter to the agency. For instance, the organizations argued the physical impact of climate change could impact a company's ability to operate or expose it to new legal proceedings.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Three years later, the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/28/business/28sec.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">agency commissioners</a> — in [a party-line vote] — finally issued <a href="https://www.sec.gov/rules/interp/2010/33-9106.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">guidance</a> suggesting how companies might go about disclosing the risks related to the impact of climate change. The guidance noted that climate change could impact how a business described itself, its legal proceedings, managements' discussion and analysis of operations, and risk factors facing the company.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"It did not change any of its rules. It just said our current rules mandate addressing the risks of climate change," explains Alan Palmiter, a business law professor at Wake Forest University.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Palmiter has <a href="https://www.ssrn.com/abstract=2639181" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">written</a> that, at first, the SEC's guidance drew a good amount of attention. He found that a "flurry" of law firms sent letters to their clients notifying them of the new guidance, with many noting that the SEC could take further action on the subject.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">However, Palmiter found that some law firms were unsure how to follow the guidance. Some also questioned the capacity of companies to determine how climate change might affect them, and some doubted the existence of climate change altogether, he found.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>But despite some initial fanfare, the guidance didn't seem to have much impact on how many — or how much — companies disclosed about their climate risks</b>. Palmiter notes that "during the first years after the SEC guidance, fewer than three-fifths of companies in the S&P 500 mentioned climate change in their 10-K annual reports" and that most of these were simply "a short one-paragraph risk factor."</font></p><p /></div><div class="rebellt-item col1" data-id="3" data-is-image="False" data-reload-ads="false" id="rebelltitem3"><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In 2014, Ceres argued the SEC had not prioritized "the financial risks and opportunities of climate change as an important disclosure issue." </b>The non-profit noted that the agency comment letters related to the adequacy of climate change-related disclosures had dwindled from 38 in 2010 to none in 2013. Many companies had said nothing about climate change in their annual SEC filings, the organization found, and disclosures were highly variable, often revealing little detailed information.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Two years later, the SEC requested comment on a wide range of issues, including climate change, but there doesn't appear to have been any subsequent action under the Trump administration. Last year, the SEC also received a request for <a href="https://www.sec.gov/rules/petitions/2018/petn4-730.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">a petition</a> for broader rulemaking governing "environmental, social, and governmental" disclosures.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">When asked about its guidance for companies in regard to climate change, the SEC directed Cheddar to the 2010 guidance. The agency did not respond to follow-up questions as to whether further guidance had been issued since then and why enforcement appears to have slowed.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Government Accountability Office's February 2018 <a href="https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/690197.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">review</a> of the guidance found that the SEC was limited because it "primarily relies on information that companies provide," couldn't subpoena more information, and the information it did have wasn't standardized across companies. It also reported that industry associations said "they consider the current climate-related disclosure requirements adequate and no additional climate-related disclosures are needed," but that "some investor groups and asset management firms have highlighted the need for companies to disclose more climate-related information." Echoing the GAO, Jim Hempstead, a managing director at Moody's <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/17/democrats-energy-industry-climate-risk-1483586" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">told Politico</a> this June, "Climate disclosures that are coming out right now are all over the map," and implying that disclosures "comparable across companies" would be more helpful.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Warren re-introduced the legislation this summer, saying it would "give investors, and the American public, the power to hold corporations accountable for their role in the climate crisis."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The failure of the 2010 guidance has been at the foundation to push this bill ahead, with the leaders of both Ceres and US SIF, citing the SEC's "lax" enforcement in their support for Warren's 2019 Climate Risk Disclosure Act.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Whether the bill will be passed or not, like so much of a growing slate of bills meant to combat the climate crisis, may rest on the ability of Democrats to win back the Senate and the White House in the upcoming election.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">And while it's not likely to be signed into law yet, Bryan McGannon, director of government relations at US SIF, notes: "It builds a track record."<em /></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="">This story originally appeared in <a href="https://cheddar.com/media/elizabeth-warrens-climate-risk-disclosure-act-tries-to-do-what-the-sec-didnt" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">Cheddar</a>. It is republished here as part of EcoWatch's partnership with <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/covering-climate-now" target="_self" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">Covering Climate Now</a>, a global collaboration of more than 250 news outlets to strengthen coverage of the climate story.</font></em></em></em></em></em></p></div><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></em></em></em></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></em></em></em></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><a href="https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/07/17/sec-climate-risks-disclosure/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/07/17/sec-climate-risks-disclosure/</font></a></em></em></em></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><span style="box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> Karen Savage</font></span></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>A bill that would require public companies to disclose the risks posed to their business by climate change passed a crucial committee vote in the House on Wednesday. </b></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The House Financial Services Committee passed <a href="https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/116/hr3623" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit;">the Climate Risk Disclosure Act of 2019</a>, which was introduced by Illinois Rep. Sean Casten in 2018. The bill would require the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to develop and implement guidelines for companies on disclosing climate risks. The SEC would be required to make the information available to the public on its website. <br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b><span style="box-sizing: inherit;"><span style="box-sizing: inherit;">“</span></span>Climate change is a risk to the stability of the global financial system,”</b> Casten <a href="https://casten.house.gov/media/press-releases/casten-warren-climate-risk-disclosure-act-passes-house-financial-services" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit;">said</a>. “This bill presents a market-based solution to understand the impact of a changing climate on companies and provide investors, lenders, and insurers with better information.”</span><br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The bill now moves on to a vote by the full House, and if it passes, on to the Senate. With the Senate still controlled by Republicans, it is unlikely to have enough support.<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Companies are currently required to disclose the risks that other issues—including lawsuits, significant corporate events and other business trends—pose to their business in annual SEC reports known as 10-Ks. But they are not required to specifically disclose risks posed by climate change.<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>A study by <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-risk-is-poorly-represented-in-company-financial-filings/" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">ClimateWire</a> in 2016 found companies’ voluntary risk disclosures are often vague, with little useful information for investors. Because there are no standard guidelines for measuring and reporting climate risk, comparing risk from company to company is difficult, if not impossible.</b><br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Climate Risk Disclosure Act would require companies in the finance, insurance, transportation, electric power, mining and non-renewable energy sectors to disclose direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions and to disclose the total amount of fossil fuel-related assets owned or managed by those companies. Companies would be required to use specific parameters for climate scenario analyses and to disclose the methods used in calculating the social cost of carbon. That makes it easier for investors to compare companies based on their climate risk.<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Fossil fuel companies have long been accused of not providing complete, consistent or transparent information on the risk climate change poses to their business.<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Exxon is currently facing a <a href="https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2018/10/24/new-york-attorney-general-exxon-climate-fraud/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">lawsuit</a> by the New York attorney general’s office for allegedly deceiving investors for years by deliberately downplaying the climate risks to its business and long-term financial health.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In recent years, <a href="https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/05/21/bp-shareholder-resolutions-climate-change/" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">BP</a>, Exxon, Shell, Chevron and many other major fossil fuel companies have faced <a href="https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/04/11/most-oil-giants-still-fighting-shareholder-pressure-to-address-climate/" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">intense</a> shareholder <a href="https://www.asyousow.org/resolutions-tracker" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">pressure</a> to disclose their climate risks. While some have begun to deal more transparently with the issue, many continue to reject shareholder requests.</b></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A law requiring disclosure will help shareholders make better-informed investment decisions, said Danielle Fugere, president of <a href="https://www.asyousow.org/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">As You Sow</a>, a nonprofit that advocates for corporate responsibility through shareholder advocacy.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Climate change is very important to investors and shareholders because climate will impact every facet of the economy, from agriculture to supply chains to realty, we’re already seeing those impacts,” Fugere said.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“It’s impossible to predict the next PG&E <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/chunkamui/2019/01/24/pge-is-just-the-first-of-many-climate-change-bankruptcies/#21445f57e5ff" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit;">bankruptcy</a> will be—that was a bankruptcy related to climate change that nobody saw coming last year.” </font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">PG&E, California’s largest utility, has been found liable for several of the state’s largest wildfires, with climate change intensifying the conditions that lead to them. The company’s shareholders have <a href="https://azdailysun.com/pg-e-files-for-bankruptcy/article_f354ebdd-75a3-5fdb-be03-7fb96fc8f4cd.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">lost</a> more than $10 billion since the company filed for bankruptcy earlier this year.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">More than 50 investor and advocacy groups sent a letter last week to Casten and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who is a <a href="https://www.warren.senate.gov/about/committee-assignments" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">member</a> of the Senate Subcommittee on Securities, Insurance and Investment, in support of the bill.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Ensuring climate risk disclosure is standardized will allow companies and investors—especially those managing state employee pension funds and other long-term portfolios—to plan for a low-carbon future, and that science and data guide the process,” the groups <a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/files/images/2019/07/Warren-Climate-Risk-Disclosure-Sign-On%202019-7-15-19.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">wrote</a> in the letter.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Casten said residents in his home state are already feeling the effects of climate change and said it’s crucial that investors understand the risks.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“In just the past few decades rising temperatures have worsened extreme weather events; wildfire seasons are longer; in Illinois the painting season has been shortened from seven months to six months. Mosquitoes are expanding their territory, spreading tropical disease. Two feet of sea-level rise is already baked in,” Casten <a href="https://casten.house.gov/media/press-releases/casten-warren-climate-risk-disclosure-act-passes-house-financial-services" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent;">said</a>. <br style="box-sizing: inherit;" /></font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“What does that mean if you are a property manager investing in assets on Miami beach? What does that mean if you are a seed developer who has seeds that are not going to be able to germinate at the rising temperatures in my home state of Illinois?</font></em></em></em></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 22px; overflow: hidden;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“If you are an investor, you would like to know the answers to those questions.”</font></em></em></em></p></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">REPAIR THE COMMONS</font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">AHA, SYNERGISTIC, CASCADE GOOD OR BAD/DOWN</font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/environmental-reporting-can-help-protect-citizens-in-emerging-democracies-115822"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://theconversation.com/environmental-reporting-can-help-protect-citizens-in-emerging-democracies-115822</font></a></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div><p style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">What happens when an illegally logged tree falls or poachers kill endangered brown bears in the forest, but there’s no journalist to report it?</font></em></em></em></p><p style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">That’s the situation in the Republic of Georgia, which faces challenges that include poaching, deteriorating air quality, habitat disruption from new hydropower dams, illegal logging and climate change. The effects cross national borders and affect economic and political relationships <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Environmental-Crises-in-Central-Asia-From-steppes-to-seas-from-deserts/Freedman-Neuzil/p/book/9781138824843" style="outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">in the Caucasus and beyond</a>.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">I researched environmental journalism in the Republic of Georgia as a Fulbright Scholar there in the fall of 2018. I chose Georgia because many of its environmental and media problems are similar to those confronting other post-Soviet countries nearly 30 years after independence. As I have found in <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=bEOS7t8AAAAJ&hl=en" style="outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">my research</a> on mass media in other post-Soviet nations, journalists risk provoking powerful public and corporate interests when they investigate sensitive environmental issues.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>But when the media don’t cover these problems, Georgians go uninformed about issues relevant to their daily lives. Eco-violators operate with impunity, and the government and Georgia’s influential private sector remain opaque to the public. At a time when government hostility to journalists is <a href="https://rsf.org/en/2019-world-press-freedom-index-cycle-fear" style="outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">rising in many countries</a>, Georgia illustrates how environmental damage, pollution and ill health can spread, and go unpunished, when powerful interests are unaccountable to the public.</b></font></em></em></em></p></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></em></em></em></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><h2 libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" style="margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-rendering: optimizelegibility;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Transparent in principle, not in practice</font></em></em></em></h2><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></em></em></em></div></div><p><em><em><em>
</em></em></em></p><p><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font><span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"></span></em></em></em></p><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">619</font></em></em></em></div><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div><em><em><em><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/bipartisan-push-to-crack-down-on-money-laundering-and-dark-money-shell-companies"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/bipartisan-push-to-crack-down-on-money-laundering-and-dark-money-shell-companies</font></a></em></em></em></div><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></div><div><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to require obscure corporations and limited-liability companies to disclose their true owners to law enforcement to snuff out laundered cash and political “<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/dark-money/basics" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">dark money</a>” flowing into the U.S. from foreign-influenced shell companies.</b></font></em></em></em></div><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Members of Congress have introduced a number of bills mandating disclosure of companies’ <a href="https://www.investor.gov/research-before-you-invest/research/shareholder-voting/what-%E2%80%9Cregistered%E2%80%9D-owner-what-%E2%80%9Cbeneficial%E2%80%9D" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">beneficial owners</a> — the person or persons who enjoy the benefits of ownership and control the company — to federal investigators. Lawmakers are mostly attempting to crack down on money laundering and the financing of other illegal activities. But the proposed legislation could also impact foreign interference in U.S. politics.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Foreign nationals and governments are prohibited from directly or indirectly engaging in activity to influence U.S. elections. But opaque LLCs, which are not required to disclose their beneficial owners to the public or law enforcement, frequently contribute to politically-active outside groups. This untraceable process has prompted concerns that they are anonymously injecting foreign money into the U.S. political process.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>More than 4,000 LLCs contributed to groups in 2016, nearly quadruple the number in 2012.</b> In the 2016 election cycle alone, nearly $46 million came from LLCs at the federal level, nearly double the $24 million from LLCs in the 2012 presidential election cycle.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Overall, direct spending in U.S. federal elections by groups that do not disclose their donors has <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/02/somp3-billion-dollar-dark-money-tip-of-the-iceberg/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">exceeded $1 billion</a> since OpenSecrets began tracking dark money in 2006.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Opaque foreign money has also found its way to political committees. Jho Low, a fugitive Malaysian financier <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/03/jho-low-building-army-of-foreign-agents/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">accused of stealing billions</a>, allegedly <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/05/malaysian-fugitive-funneling-foreign-money-to-back-obama/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">used a shell company</a> to funnel more than $1 million to a pro-Barack Obama super PAC ahead of the 2012 presidential election. Low has not only been charged in relation to his alleged illegal foreign contributions in support of Obama, but has also been tied to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/doj-probes-whether-fugitive-financier-supplied-donation-to-trump-re-election-committee-11552482187" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">suspicious money transfers</a> funneling money into President Donald Trump’s joint fundraising committee.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These anonymous shell companies also show up in <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/fara/background" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Foreign Agents Registration Act</a> filings, <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/03/foreign-influence-operations-beneficiary-revealed-to-be-ukrainian-politician-targeted-by-paul-manafort/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">masking the source of money</a> behind influence campaigns and undermining the intent of the law to provide transparency on foreign influence activities.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Lax corporate disclosure laws have turned the U.S. into a top destination for shell companies. Last year, the U.S. surpassed the Cayman Islands to become the second largest haven for secretive offshore accounts and shell companies, <a href="https://www.financialsecrecyindex.com/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">according to a report</a> from London-based Tax Justice Network.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“We’re becoming second only to Switzerland in the place people pick to put their money,” Senate Judiciary Chairman <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00009975" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Lindsey Graham</a> (R-S.C.) said during Wednesday’s hearing on shell companies. “Being second in a lot of things is good … not here.”</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Lawmakers have introduced a number of bills to address the flow of untraceable money. Senate Judiciary Committee members <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00027533" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Sheldon Whitehouse</a> (D-R.I.) and <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00001758" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Chuck Grassley</a> (R-Iowa) <a href="https://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/news-releases/whitehouse-grassley-introduce-title-act-curb-proliferation-anonymous-shell" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">introduced legislation</a> Tuesday that would require corporations to turn over beneficial ownership information to law enforcement in the event of a subpoena or summons.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;" /><div style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">A </span><a href="https://www.warner.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2019/6/warner-cotton-jones-rounds-unveil-draft-legislation" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" inherit="inherit" max-height="max-height" e="e" px="px" background-image="background-image" initial="initial" background-position="background-position" background-size="background-size" background-repeat="background-repeat" background-attachment="background-attachment" background-origin="background-origin" background-clip="background-clip" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">bipartisan group of senators</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> in early June proposed their own bill to combat abuse of shell companies, requiring that corporations and LLCs disclose their beneficial owners to the Treasury Department. Reps. </span><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00000078" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" inherit="inherit" max-height="max-height" e="e" px="px" background-image="background-image" initial="initial" background-position="background-position" background-size="background-size" background-repeat="background-repeat" background-attachment="background-attachment" background-origin="background-origin" background-clip="background-clip" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">Carolyn Maloney</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> (D-N.Y.), </span><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00001193" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" inherit="inherit" max-height="max-height" e="e" px="px" background-image="background-image" initial="initial" background-position="background-position" background-size="background-size" background-repeat="background-repeat" background-attachment="background-attachment" background-origin="background-origin" background-clip="background-clip" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">Peter King</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> (R-N.Y.) and </span><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00041843&cycle=2018" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" inherit="inherit" max-height="max-height" e="e" px="px" background-image="background-image" initial="initial" background-position="background-position" background-size="background-size" background-repeat="background-repeat" background-attachment="background-attachment" background-origin="background-origin" background-clip="background-clip" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">Tom Malinowski</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> (D-N.J.) </span><a href="https://maloney.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/reps-maloney-king-and-malinowski-introduce-bipartisan-corporate" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" inherit="inherit" max-height="max-height" e="e" px="px" background-image="background-image" initial="initial" background-position="background-position" background-size="background-size" background-repeat="background-repeat" background-attachment="background-attachment" background-origin="background-origin" background-clip="background-clip" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">introduced similar legislation</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> in May.</span></em></em></em></div><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Whitehouse and Grassley, along with Graham and Sen. <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary/dick-durbin?cid=N00004981" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Dick Durbin</a> (D-Ill.) have also introduced legislation to specifically address political contributions from shell companies. The bill, first <a href="https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/release/senators-introduce-bipartisan-bill-to-crack-down-on-illegal-election-spending-by-foreign-nationals-using-shell-companies" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">introduced last year</a>, would make it a felony for individuals to use or help set up a shell company to conceal illegal political activity such as foreign political contributions.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Treasury Department’s financial crimes enforcement unit <a href="https://www.fincen.gov/resources/statutes-and-regulations/cdd-final-rule" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">finalized a rule</a> last year that requires financial institutions to collect beneficial ownership information for customers opening accounts. But experts say the rule won’t stop the flow of money from foreign shell companies, making Congressional action necessary.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“This was a step in the right direction. But the primary responsibility for identifying the owners of a company cannot lie with banks. It should lie with the companies themselves, at the time of incorporation or when their ownership changes,” former Acting Treasury Secretary Adam Szubin <a href="https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Szubin%20Testimony.pdf" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">told</a>the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday. “And FinCEN’s rule does nothing to illuminate the ownership of shell companies incorporated in the U.S. that exclusively open bank accounts abroad, a route that many dirty companies have followed.”</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The House passed the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/389/all-info" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Rewards Act</a>, which would reward whistleblowers who notify the U.S. of assets linked to corrupt foreign individuals, in May. The legislation is currently being considered by the Senate Banking Committee, which will <a href="https://www.banking.senate.gov/hearings/outside-perspectives-on-the-collection-of-beneficial-ownership-information" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">hold a hearing</a> Thursday on the topic of beneficial ownership collection. Among the organizations testifying are the <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000071124&year=2019" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Bank Policy Institute</a>and <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000050749&year=2019" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Financial Accountability and Corporate Transparency Coalition</a>, both groups pushing for disclosure of beneficial ownership to law enforcement.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These kinds of measures find support from a number of powerful trade associations, public interest groups and think tanks, ranging from the <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000000087&year=2019" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">American Banking Association</a> to <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000055782" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Public Citizen</a> to the <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=D000031480&cycle=2018" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">American Enterprise Institute</a>.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Center for Responsive Politics Executive Director Sheila Krumholz <a href="https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/meetings/combating-kleptocracy-beneficial-ownership-money-laundering-and-other-reforms" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee</a> Wednesday, <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/combating-kleptocracy-beneficial-ownership-money-laundering-and-other-reforms/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">detailing</a> how shell companies inject money into U.S. politics and advocating for greater transparency of beneficial ownership.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A few organizations have come out against the proposed measures. The <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000000160" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">National Federation of Independent Business</a> has voiced opposition to some of the disclosure measures, expressing concern over the regulatory burden it would place on small businesses. The <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000043801" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">American Bar Association</a> also <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/uncategorized/GAO/2019may6-lettertohfscopposinghr2513substitutebill.pdf" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">expressed concerns</a> about privacy.</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">None of the beneficial ownership proposals would propose creating a public registry of beneficial ownership information for businesses. Although some foreign countries keep their own running registries of these owners, U.S. lawmakers have not shown interest in expanding disclosure to that level, citing privacy concerns.</font></em></em></em></p><div style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></em></em></em></div><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">AHA: you do not need to get rid of a rule (DEREG) if you get rid of enforcement or even the evidence/info that a problem exists
</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/dying-on-the-job-how-workers-get-hurt-when-businesses-keep-deadly-secrets/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/dying-on-the-job-how-workers-get-hurt-when-businesses-keep-deadly-secrets/</a>
</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">omg</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em></p><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Unfortunately, at the same time, the U.S. Occupational Safety and
Health Administration (OSHA) reduced its workplace safety inspectors <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/apr/25/trump-safety-cuts-workplace-deaths-report">to the lowest level in its 48-year history</a>, diminishing its capacity to investigate workplace deaths, illnesses and injuries.<b> And it <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/01/25/2019-00101/tracking-of-workplace-injuries-and-illnesses">reversed a rule</a> that would have provided more information about workplace dangers nationally. It decided to <a href="https://www.osha.gov/recordkeeping/finalrule/finalrule_faq.html">stop requiring large employers to electronically report</a> injury and illness data.</b> <b>OSHA still requires employers to document this information, but they don’t have to tell anyone.</b></font></span></em></em></em></p><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></em></em></em><p style="text-align: left;"><em><em><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Frank Leasure case illustrates how this decision endangers
workers. The USW Health and Safety Department conducts what it calls
learning events, also known as accident investigations, at USW job
sites, shares information about the problems it finds and publishes
online hazard alerts that recommend methods to prevent recurrence.</font></em></em></em></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These hazard alerts don’t blame and shame. They don’t name the
company where the incident occurred or the victim. They describe what
happened and then recommend ways to prevent similar injuries and deaths.
They’re intended to help local unions and employers identify and
eliminate similar hazards in their workplaces.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...
</font></p><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-wheeler-emails-polluting-industries-2625417216.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-wheeler-emails-polluting-industries-2625417216.html</a></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">many lnx</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Court Rules EPA Must Release 20,000 Emails Between Wheeler, Other Top Officials and Polluting Industries</b></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A federal court has ordered that top officials at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)—including Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler—must release about 20,000 emails exchanged with industry groups, The Washington Post reported Monday.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The December 26 decision by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California was the result of a lawsuit brought by the Sierra Club after the EPA missed its deadline in responding to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. The environmental group had sought the emails to see how industry contacts might be influencing decisions by officials like Wheeler, a former coal lobbyist, to roll back Obama-era regulations on climate-change causing emissions and other pollutants.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The law is clear: the EPA must produce these documents, it must do so quickly, and if necessary it must re-allocate staff to speed things up and lift the curtain on the toxic relationship between Trump's appointees and the polluters they are supposed to be protecting us from," Senior Sierra Club Attorney Elena Saxonhouse, who helped argue the case, said in a press release.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The court mandated a 10 month timeline for the release of the documents, which will begin as soon as the federal government fully reopens pending the end of the ongoing shutdown. The FOIA request targeted 25 Trump administration officials at the EPA including Wheeler, Office of Air and Radiation head and former corporate lawyer Bill Wehrum, top Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention official and former chemical industry lobbyist Nancy Beck and Albert "Kell" Kelly, who was formerly in charge of a task force on improving the way the EPA cleans toxic sites and has a lifetime ban from working in banking, The Washington Post reported.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">The EPA had said it was so inundated with FOIA requests that it needed until 2022 to release the documents, but the Sierra Club argued successfully that the release could not wait that long, in part because President Donald Trump has indicated he will nominate Wheeler to officially replace former Administrator Scott Pruitt, who resigned in part because of scandals revealed through previous Sierra Club FOIA requests.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The Senate should not act on Wheeler's expected nomination until we know exactly what he is up to behind the scenes. The revelations which FOIA'd emails uncovered about Scott Pruitt were unprecedented, shocking, and helped bring about his rapid downfall," Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said in the press release. "Now, we await tens of thousands of emails between Andrew Wheeler, his industry-conflicted deputies, and the polluters they are supposed to be protecting us from. Given Wheeler and Wherum's history of exclusively protecting polluter profits, we can only imagine what abuses these documents are likely to uncover."</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA: Wheeler's calendar sheds light on industry meetings -- Monday ... ›</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In Andrew Wheeler, Trump Gets a Cannier E.P.A. Chief | The New ... ›</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These conflicts of interest make Wheeler wrong for EPA ... ›</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA Cuts Science Panel That Reviewed Deadly Air Pollutants ›</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">znk doi foia ESA</font></font></font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/01/trumps-interior-department-wants-to-shut-down-your-access-to-information/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/01/trumps-interior-department-wants-to-shut-down-your-access-to-information/</a></font></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Zinke <a href="https://www.dcreport.org/2018/12/17/zinke-hightails-it-out-of-town/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">is out as secretary of the Interior,</a> but in his last days in office he tried to suppress what we can learn about the destruction Trump is doing to our nation’s public lands.</font></font></font></p><div class="p0_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Attorney <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/trump-town/staffers/daniel-jorjani" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Daniel Jorjani,</a> who previously worked at the Koch-funded Freedom Partners, drafted a proposed rule that would <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/12/28/2018-27561/freedom-of-information-act-regulations" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">slash the public’s ability to get public records</a> from the 10 agencies in the Interior Department.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The <a href="https://www.foia.gov/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Freedom of Information Act,</a> a federal law signed by former President Lyndon Johnson in 1966, allows people to ask for previously unreleased documents. The law was passed after <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/1960s/freedom-of-information-act" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">thousands of federal employees accused of being communists were fired</a> during the McCarthy era, and the Eisenhower administration wouldn’t release records from the dismissals.</font></font></font></p><div class="p2_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“I signed this measure with a deep sense of pride that <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nsa/foia/FOIARelease66.pdf" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">the United States is an open society in which the people’s right to know is cherished and guarded,”</a> Johnson said after he signed the law.</font></font></font></p><div class="p3_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Notable uses of the law include environmentalists learning that the EPA knew in the 1980s that paper mills were discharging toxic dioxin into rivers.</font></font></font></p><div class="p4_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="teadsNative" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jorjani’s proposal would allow the Interior Department to reject requests that the Trump administration decides are “unreasonably burdensome.” Currently, agencies must fulfill records requests despite how much time and effort is required to search for records.</font></font></font></p><div class="p5_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“The bureau will not honor a request that requires an unreasonably burdensome search or requires the bureau to locate, review, redact, or arrange for inspection of a vast quantity of material,” he wrote.</font></font></font></p><div class="p6_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The proposal would also allow the Interior Department to impose a monthly limit for processing records.</font></font></font></p><div class="p7_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“We’re deeply concerned about these proposed changes,” said Nada Culver, senior counsel for <a href="https://www.wilderness.org/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">The Wilderness Society.</a></font></font></font></p><div class="p8_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jorjani, the principal deputy solicitor, was on the transition team in the Interior Department after Trump took office and has run the department’s legal office. The nominee for the job, Ryan Nelson, withdrew and was nominated to fill an appellate court vacancy.</font></font></font></p><div class="p9_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jorjani wrote that the Interior Department wants to make the changes because of increases in records requests since Trump took office. FOIA requests have increased 30% from fiscal 2016 to fiscal 2018 as environmentalists and others have sought information to oppose Zinke’s <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3051026" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">rollbacks of public lands protections.</a></font></font></font></p><div class="p10_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Alex Thompson, a spokeswoman for <a href="https://www.wilderness.org/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">The Wilderness Society,</a> said publishing the proposed regulation wasn’t allowed during the government shutdown when only necessary or emergency notices are to be published.</font></font></font></p><div class="p11_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">People have until Jan. 28 to comment on the proposed changes.</font></font></font></p><div class="p12_19" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Zinke also <a href="https://www.dcreport.org/2018/10/23/zinke-destroy-interior-department-records/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">tried to get permission to destroy some records about what animals are protected</a> under the Endangered Species Act. A recent memo at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department, part of the Interior Department, directs staffers to withhold or delay releasing some public documents about how the Endangered Species Act is carried out....</font></font></font></p></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">loss</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/blog-posts/confirmed-judges-confirmed-fears-trump-circuit-judge-tries-to-strike-down-lobbyist-registration-and-disclosure-law-as-applied-to-unpaid-lobbyist-on-free-speech-grounds/">http://www.pfaw.org/blog-posts/confirmed-judges-confirmed-fears-trump-circuit-judge-tries-to-strike-down-lobbyist-registration-and-disclosure-law-as-applied-to-unpaid-lobbyist-on-free-speech-grounds/</a>?utm_medium=email&utm_source=nl&utm_campaign=december2018</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"<em style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;"><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/confirmed-judges-confirmed-fears/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">Confirmed Judges, Confirmed Fears”</a> is a blog series documenting the harmful impact of President Trump’s judges on Americans’ rights and liberties. </em></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Trump Eighth Circuit Judge David Stras dissented from an opinion by two other Republican-appointed judges in late November and argued that Missouri’s lobbyist registration and disclosure law violated the First Amendment as applied to an unpaid conservative lobbyist. The majority strongly disagreed with Stras’ attempt to expand the reach of decisions like <em style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;">Citizens United </em>and explained that the state’s interest in transparency and public disclosure of who is trying to influence legislation clearly warranted the minimal burdens imposed by the law.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Ronald Calzone is the president, director, and unpaid lobbyist for Missouri First, a conservative nonprofit organization that regularly lobbies members of the state legislature. He filed a First Amendment challenge to the Missouri lobbying registration and disclosure law. The law simply requires filling out a form and paying a $10 fee once each year, as well as filing additional reports concerning lobbying-related expenditures. The district court rejected his claim that the law was unconstitutional as applied to him as an unpaid lobbyist, and he appealed.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">In <em style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;"><a href="https://www.ifs.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018-11-28_Calzone-v-MEC-Eighth-Circuit-opinion-.pdf" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">Calzone v. Summers</a>, </em>Judges Steven Colloton and Bobby Shepherd, both appointed by President George W. Bush, affirmed the lower court decision, but Judge Stras dissented. The majority explained that it was improper to consider Calzone’s additional argument that he makes no lobbying-related expenditures, as Judge Stras did in dissent, because that argument had not been raised below or even in the court of appeals until oral argument, noting that Stras’ view to the contrary was “unfair” to the lower court and to the state. All three judges agreed that <em style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;">Citizens United </em>required “exacting scrutiny” of the law as applied to Calzone, but Stras claimed that the state’s interest in “transparency” was not enough.</font></span></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The majority strongly disagreed, explaining that based on precedent, there was a strong interest in disclosure of who is “pressuring and attempting to influence legislators.” They also noted that even unpaid lobbyists could offer “things of value” to legislators, raising the state interest in “avoiding the fact or appearance of public corruption.” The burden of complying with the law was “minimal,” they stated, particularly if Calzone did not make lobbying-related expenditures as he claimed in the court of appeals.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Overall, the majority concluded, the state system was “precisely that which we have previously held would satisfy” the requirement that such a disclosure law have a “substantial relationship” to the state’s interests. Stras’ dissent, on the other hand, would have further extended efforts in <em style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;">Citizens United</em> and similar cases to misuse the First Amendment to undermine important public disclosure laws.</font></font></font></p><div class="at-below-post addthis_tool" data-url="http://www.pfaw.org/blog-posts/confirmed-judges-confirmed-fears-trump-circuit-judge-tries-to-strike-down-lobbyist-registration-and-disclosure-law-as-applied-to-unpaid-lobbyist-on-free-speech-grounds/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="tags" style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; border-top: 5px solid rgb(239, 243, 243); margin: 2em 0px; padding-top: 1em; line-height: 1.5; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000" /></font></font><p style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1em; display: inline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><strong style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear;">Tags:</strong></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font>
<a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/confirmed-judges-confirmed-fears/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">Confirmed Judges Confirmed Fears</a><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/david-stras/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">David Stras</a><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/fighting-big-money-in-politics/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">Fighting Big Money in Politics</a><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/lobbying/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">lobbying</a><a href="http://www.pfaw.org/topics/money-in-politics/" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em; text-decoration-line: none;">money in politics</a></p></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-endangered-species-decisions-2613623876.html</font></font></p><h1 class="widgetheadline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; cursor: pointer; overflow-wrap: break-word; line-height: 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a class="widgetheadline-text custom-post-headline" href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-endangered-species-decisions-2613623876.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-break: break-word; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Leaked Trump Administration Memo: Keep Public in Dark About How Endangered Species Decisions Are Made</font></a></font></h1><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url expanded" data-elid="2613623876" data-authors="Center for Biological Diversity" data-headline="Leaked Trump Administration Memo: Keep Public in Dark About How Endangered Species Decisions Are Made" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px;"><div class="body-description"><div class="widgetbrief"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">In a Trump administration memorandum leaked to the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is directing its staff to withhold, or delay releasing, certain public records about how the Endangered Species Act is carried out. That includes records where the advice of career wildlife scientists may be overridden by political appointees in the Trump administration.</font></font></p></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms ease 0s; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">"This is a clear attempt to stifle science and boost Trump's anti-wildlife agenda," said Meg Townsend, the Center for Biological Diversity's open government attorney. "The public has every right to know how our government makes decisions about the fate of our most endangered species. This memo keeps the public in the dark and creates the perfect environment for political meddling."</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><b>The memo recommends that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service limit the information released to the public for decisions regarding species protected under the Endangered Species Act. It provides a list of types of records for agency staff to withhold, including drafts of policies and rules, briefing documents and decision meeting notes and summaries.</b></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The agency has already implemented aspects of this guidance in actions like the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2011/keystone-xl-pipeline-10-05-2011.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; overflow-wrap: break-word;">Keystone XL pipeline construction lawsuit</a>, and in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's decision last year to prematurely remove endangered species protection from <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2017/grizzly-bear-08-30-2017.php" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; overflow-wrap: break-word;">Yellowstone grizzly bears</a>, as the memo confirms.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">"Directing the agency to hide science violates every notion of the scientific process, which is supposed to be open and reviewable," said Townsend. "If the Service covers up dissenting views, it can get away with all kinds of bad decisions that could do enormous damage to some of America's most imperiled plants and animals."</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><b>As this memo recommends that agency staff take a less transparent approach, Trump's anti-wildlife agenda is being pushed at all levels of government. </b>Removing the public's ability to know what its government is doing—which is contrary to the spirit of the Freedom of Information Act—means that it will be more difficult to legally challenge agency actions that harm imperiled wildlife.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><b>"This Trump memo would send all future Fish and Wildlife Service decisions into a black hole and result in more animals going extinct,"</b> Townsend said. "If the Trump administration would simply let the Fish and Wildlife Service follow the law and support decisions with science, it wouldn't need the memo or have anything to hide."</font></font></p></div></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">yay but why do the right thing?</font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/stunning-supreme-court-decision-dark-money-were-about-know-lot-more-about-who-funding-our-elections">https://www.alternet.org/stunning-supreme-court-decision-dark-money-were-about-know-lot-more-about-who-funding-our-elections</a></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>
</b></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">a win for increased transparency and those demanding an end to the so-called "dark money" eating away at U.S. democracy, the Supreme Court on Tuesday lifted a previous stay on a lower court ruling by rejecting the argument by right-wing advocacy groups who said they should not have to reveal the identity of big-dollar donors who fund their issue-based campaign ads.</span></b></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</span></font></font></div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Crucially, the ruling means that groups that in the past have been able to hide the source of their funding before, during, and after campaigns will have now have to <b>make that information available before voters go to the polls</b>—in this case, that means before the upcoming mid-term elections. Effective immediately, any group or individual making more than $250 in express advocacy ads — ads that tell viewers who to vote for or against — must now disclose the identities of all contributors who gave more than $200 in a year. </font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As the <em>Huffington Post</em> <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/dark-money-disclosure-2018_us_5ba1691ce4b046313fc03baa" style="text-decoration-line: none;">reports</a>:</font></font></p><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin-bottom: 20px;"><blockquote style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The decision came about after Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal watchdog group, fought for the past six years to get the Federal Election Commission to enforce campaign finance laws against Crossroads GPS, a conservative nonprofit group founded by Karl Rove, a senior adviser to George W. Bush when he was president. CREW finally won its battle on Tuesday.</b></font></font></p></blockquote><blockquote style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As of Sept. 18, any group that runs a<b>n independent expenditure ― election ads that expressly call for the election or defeat of a candidate </b>― in excess of $250 will have to disclose all political donors above $200.</font></font></p></blockquote><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Norm Eisen, the chairperson of CREW, <a href="https://twitter.com/NormEisen/status/1042132286806929408" style="text-decoration-line: none;">celebrated the decision</a> on Twitter: "We are about to drive a lot of dark money donors into the light—it's gonna look like the climax of a Harry Potter movie where the creatures shrivel in the sun."</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.publicintegrity.org/2018/09/18/22264/dark-money-politics-about-get-lighter" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Writing</a> for the <em>Center for Public Integrity</em>, Dave Levinthal and Sarah Kleiner report that "secret money in politics will soon be a lot less secret."</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">And while Levinthal and Kleiner quoted Federal Election Commission Vice Chairwoman Ellen Weintraub, who said it won't be surprising to see some groups "come up with clever ways of getting around the rules," champions of disclosure said the ruling is a major crack in the armor of the forces of those using shadowing groups and their vast fortunes to undermine democracy.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"This is a great day for transparency and democracy," said Noah Bookbinder, CREW's executive director. "Three courts, including the Supreme Court, have now rejected Crossroads' arguments for a stay, meaning we're about to know a lot more about who is funding our elections."</font></font></p><div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></div></div><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><ul helvetica="Helvetica" neue="Neue" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" text-align="text-align" center="center" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; margin: 20px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><li class="hidden-xs" style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; list-style-type: none; padding: 0px 0px 23px; font-weight: 700; line-height: 1.33;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a data-ga-action="Home Headlines: Headline" href="https://www.democracynow.org/2018/8/17/headlines/1_400_google_workers_protest_plans_for_censored_chinese_search_engine" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; border: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">1,400 Google Workers Protest Plans for Censored Chinese Search Engine</font></a></font></li></ul><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">great firewall 2.0</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="">, </span><a href="https://boingboing.net/2018/08/01/great-firewall-of-google.html" libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">a source leaked the existence of "Project Dragonfly"</a><span libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="">, a super-secret Google plan to create a censored search-tool for use in China. </span><a href="https://boingboing.net/2018/08/03/project-dragonfly.html" class="read-more" libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">Read the rest</a></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">hree-thousand Google employees have signed a <a href="https://static01.nyt.com/files/2018/technology/googleletter.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">letter</a> protesting the internet giant’s contract with the Defense Department to develop artificial intelligence in order to analyze imagery collected by drones.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The employees are calling on Google CEO Sundar Pichai to cancel the project immediately and to “enforce a clear policy stating that neither Google nor its contractors will ever build warfare technology.”</font></font></p><div id="TeadsNative" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Google is collaborating with the Pentagton’s Project Maven, which was established in April 2017 “to deploy computer algorithms to war zones by year’s end, “according to one Defense Department <a href="https://www.defense.gov/News/Article/Article/1254719/project-maven-to-deploy-computer-algorithms-to-war-zone-by-years-end/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">press release</a>. The focus of the project is “38 classes of objects that represent the kinds of things the department needs to detect, especially in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.”</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></p></div><div style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /></font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>I.R.S. Will No Longer Force Kochs and Other Groups to Disclose Donors</b></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">The Internal Revenue Service will no longer require labor unions, social clubs and many political groups, like Americans for Prosperity, financed by David Koch, left, and Charles Koch, to disclose their large donors</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">By Patricia Cohen, Kenneth P. Vogel and Jim Tankersley</div><div style="text-align: left;">July 17, 2018</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">The Trump administration will end a longstanding requirement that certain nonprofit organizations disclose the names of large donors to the Internal Revenue Service, a move that will allow some political groups to shield their sources of funding from government scrutiny.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">The change, which has long been sought by conservatives and Republicans in Congress, will affect thousands of labor unions, social clubs and political groups as varied as arms of the AARP, the United States Chamber of Commerce, the National Rifle Association and Americans for Prosperity, which is funded partly by the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Such groups have played an increasingly prominent role in American politics in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in a case brought by the nonprofit group Citizens United, which empowered them to spend unlimited money on campaign ads.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Treasury officials said the reporting change — which affects contributions known as dark money because their source is hidden — would protect privacy and reduce compliance costs for nonprofit organizations. The I.R.S. could still request donor information from groups in the rare event that it was needed for tax scrutiny.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">“Americans shouldn’t be required to send the I.R.S. information that it doesn’t need to effectively enforce our tax laws, and the I.R.S. simply does not need tax returns with donor names and addresses to do its job in this area,” Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, said in a statement on Monday evening.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">But critics denounced the measure, saying it would encourage political donations from both domestic and foreign contributors who want to skirt the law or keep their influence secret.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">“It’s a clear signal that the I.R.S. and now the Treasury Department are not interested in any significant oversight of nonprofits,” said Marcus S. Owens, a Washington lawyer and former director of the I.R.S. division for tax-exempt organizations. “What they’re doing is excusing them from filing information that is of material importance for determining whether organizations are operating appropriately and within the boundaries of the rules.”</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer, a law professor at Notre Dame Law School, said it would further diminish reporting requirements for the groups. “This will make so-called dark money a bit darker,” he said.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Previously, nonprofit organizations like unions and organizations registered under section 501(c)(4) of the tax code were required to report to the government the names of donors who contributed more than $5,000 in the span of a year. That information was redacted on the publicly viewable forms the groups file annually, though amounts of donations remain visible.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Nonprofit groups that exist primarily to influence political campaigns, including so-called 527 organizations, will still be required to report the names of large donors, as will charities that accept tax-deductible contributions.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Conservative groups and donors had been lobbying the Trump administration to make the change, partly by arguing that the reporting requirement made their funders vulnerable to exposure by the I.R.S. and state regulators.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“Transparency is meant for the government, not for private individuals,” said Philip Ellender, the head lobbyist for Koch Industries, the international conglomerate owned by the Koch brothers. <b>Koch Industries began lobbying the White House on the issue after President Trump’s election, according to lobbying filings.</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Additionally, Americans for Prosperity and other 501(c)(4) organizations in the Koch brothers’ network of advocacy groups were among dozens of such nonprofit groups to sign onto a letter sent in May to Mr. Trump and Mr. Mnuchin declaring a policy change “an issue of utmost importance.” The letter accused the I.R.S. of “targeting of nonprofit organizations on the basis of ideology.”</span></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Officials with the Treasury Department largely echoed that reasoning, explaining that the move was driven in part by the I.R.S.’s inappropriate targeting of political groups during the administrations of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. The I.R.S. inspector general found that both conservative and progressive groups were targeted and that I.R.S. officials inappropriately sought information on donors to Tea Party groups as well as to liberal groups.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">In guidance issued by the I.R.S. late on Monday, administration officials said that the agency did not need personally identifiable donor information “in order for it to carry out its responsibilities.”</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">“The requirement to report such information increases compliance costs for some private parties, consumes I.R.S. resources in connection with the redaction of such information, and poses a risk of inadvertent disclosure of information that is not open to public inspection,” the guidance said.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>There are many examples of inadvertent disclosure </b>of donor information from federal forms in recent years. In 2013, the I.R.S. posted a list of donors to an arm of the <b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Republican Governors Association.</b> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In 2016, a federal judge cited a pattern of such disclosures when ruling against the State of California’s request for donor information from Americans for Prosperity.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The ruling noted that the state had posted more than 1,700 confidential donor lists on the internet, including the names and addresses of hundreds of donors to Planned Parenthood.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">The I.R.S. will now be able to see those groups’ lists of big donors only if it specifically requests them. Those lists are not open to the public under existing rules.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Steven M. Rosenthal of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center said the change effectively ends the agency’s oversight. “The I.R.S. audits tax-exempt organizations once in a blue moon and only after many years,” said Mr. Rosenthal, noting that the agency has been starved for resources and has had to cut back enforcement. “It’s an impossible challenge” to follow the money trail at that point.</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Republicans hailed the move, with Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, on Tuesday calling the decision “particularly welcome news to those of us who intently are focused on defending the First Amendment, for those of us who over the years have raised concerns during the last administration about activist regulators punishing free speech and free association. It’s a straightforward, common sense policy decision.”</div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Democrats shot back, with Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat and the ranking member on the Finance Committee, saying the decision would allow “anonymous foreign donors to funnel dark money into nonprofits.”</span></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div><div style="text-align: left;">ref below</div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">=</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/why-the-irs-recent-dark-money-decision-may-be-less-dire-than-it-seems" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">https://www.propublica.org/article/why-the-irs-recent-dark-money-decision-may-be-less-dire-than-it-seems</a></font></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Starting next year, the Internal Revenue Service will no longer collect the names of major donors to thousands of nonprofit organizations, from the National Rifle Association to the American Civil Liberties Union to the AARP. Democratic members of Congress and critics of money in politics blasted the move, <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm426" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">announced last week</a> by the Treasury Department, the IRS’ parent agency. The Democrats claim the new policy will expand the flow of so-called dark money — contributions from undisclosed donors used to fund election activities — in American politics. For their part, Republicans and conservative groups praised the decision as a much-needed step to avoid chilling the First Amendment rights of private citizens.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Supreme Court’s decision in <em style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">Citizens United</em> unleashed these groups, typically organized as <b>501(c)(4) </b>nonprofits, to spend unlimited amounts of money on campaign ads. Their role in American politics has grown increasingly central. In theory, the new IRS policy could have a significant impact on the tax agency’s ability to detect improper contributions — and thereby curb illegal campaign spending.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">But in practice, even critics acknowledge that the IRS very rarely audits nonprofits. In other words, the IRS will no longer receive information that it was seemingly making little use of. And the information in question was already shielded from the public’s view.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Up to now, IRS regulations have required all types of nonprofits to report the names and addresses of each major donor, as well as the dollar amount the donor contributed that year, on their tax returns. But the IRS can override this reporting requirement in certain cases when it finds that the information is “not necessary for the efficient administration of the internal revenue laws.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">That’s what the IRS did last week — relieving most nonprofits, excluding 501(c)(3) charities and]</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Treasury Department pointed to 2015 changes to the tax code that exempted from taxation many gifts or contributions to nonprofits. Without the need to ensure that donors were paying taxes on their contributions, the department reasoned, there was no need for the identities of the donors. foundations, of the need to report the names and addresses of major donors. “</span>The IRS simply does not need tax returns with donor names and addresses to do its job in this area,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm426" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">press release</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Critics of the move, however, question the sincerity of that rationale. They note that a number of largely conservative organizations, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/17/us/politics/irs-will-no-longer-force-kochs-and-other-groups-to-disclose-donors.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">like those affiliated with billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch</a>, <a href="https://cfif.org/v/images/pdfs/CFIF-Coalition-Letter-to-WH-and-Treasury-Schedule-B-FINAL-05-2018.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">have lobbied</a> Congress and the Trump administration to eliminate this reporting requirement since 2017. Treasury’s “narrow argument that the gift tax has been eliminated so they don’t need this for the specific purpose of enforcing tax law — given the timing, that’s problematic,</span>” said Brendan Fischer of the watchdog group Campaign Legal Center.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Treasury also cited a more partisan reason for the decision: “Conservative tax-exempt groups were disproportionately impacted by improper screening in the previous Administration.” Allegations during the Obama administration that IRS officials had subjected Tea Party groups seeking tax-exempt status to improper scrutiny touched off a political firestorm that led several senior IRS officials to resign.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">But a Treasury Department inspector general report ultimately <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2017reports/201710054fr.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">found</a> that both conservative and liberal groups had been subject to such IRS scrutiny and that it had occurred during both the Bush and Obama administrations.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It remains unclear the extent to which the IRS’ decision will reduce oversight of election spending. As ProPublica and others <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/how-nonprofits-spend-millions-on-elections-and-call-it-public-welfare" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: inherit; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgba(33, 124, 227, 0); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.2s ease 0s;">have documented</a>, nonprofits have become a common vehicle for election spending while shielding their donors from public view.</font></p><p tiempos="Tiempos" text="Text" serif="serif" vertical-align="vertical-align" baseline="baseline" color="color" rgb="rgb" background-color="background-color" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 1em; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p></div></div></div><div style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/trumps-department-energy-neuters-nuclear-oversight-safety-board">https://www.alternet.org/trumps-department-energy-neuters-nuclear-oversight-safety-board</a></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.propublica.org/atpropublica/meet-the-seven-reporters-joining-us-on-propublicas-local-reporting-network" style="text-decoration-line: none;">ProPublica Local Reporting Network</a>.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The Trump administration has quietly taken steps that may inhibit independent oversight of its most high-risk nuclear facilities, including some buildings at Los Alamos National Laboratory, a Department of Energy document shows.</b></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">An order <a href="https://www.directives.doe.gov/directives-documents/100-series/0140.1-BOrder/@@images/file" style="text-decoration-line: none;">published</a> on the department’s website in mid-May outlines<b> new limits on the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board</b> — including preventing the board from accessing sensitive information, imposing additional legal hurdles on board staff, and mandating that Energy Department officials speak “with one voice” when communicating with the board. The board has, by statute, operated independently and has been provided largely unfettered access to the nation’s nuclear weapons complexes in order to assess accidents or safety concerns that could pose a grave risk to workers and the public. The main exception has been access to the nuclear weapons themselves.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">For many years, the board asked the Department of Energy to provide annual reviews of how well facilities handled nuclear materials vulnerable to a runaway chain reaction — and required federal officials to brief the board on the findings. It also has urged the energy secretary not to restart certain nuclear operations at various sites until work could be done safely.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">At Los Alamos, the board has conducted ongoing reviews of the plutonium facility, holding hearings in Santa Fe and in recent years identifying imminent and “major deficiencies” in the building that could put the public at risk in the event of an earthquake. The lab sits on an active and complex geological fault system capable of causing a high magnitude quake.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>The Energy Department’s order </b>is the latest effort to limit transparency and weaken the board’s ability to conduct oversight, experts and critics say. </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">And it represents another step by the Trump administration to </span><a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/trumps-labor-department-eviscerates-workplace-safety-panels" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-line: none;">stall or halt the work done</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> by advisory boards and committees across the federal government, including a scientific advisory board at the Environmental Protection Agency and several of the Department of Labor’s advisory committees established to protect worker safety and health.</span></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">“This administration is very regressive,” said Robert Alvarez, who helped draft the legislation that created the board in the 1980s as a senate staff expert for Sen. John Glenn, D-Ohio, and subsequently served as senior policy adviser for former Energy Secretary Bill Richardson. “We shouldn’t have to wait for something to blow up or catch fire in order to pay attention to a safety problem.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">nader pentagon refused to submit req reports to GAO for decades?!</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">see dark $</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0.4em 0px 0.5em; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/focus-on-the-family-has-declared-itself-a-church-avoiding-irs-disclosure-rules/">http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/focus-on-the-family-has-declared-itself-a-church-avoiding-irs-disclosure-rules/</a></font></span></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0.4em 0px 0.5em; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/keystone-xl-approval-2538558599.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/keystone-xl-approval-2538558599.html</a></font></p><div class="headline-container" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><h1 class="headline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px; padding: 0px; position: relative; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Inside the Trump Admin's Fight to Keep the Keystone XL Approval Process Secret</font></h1></div><div id="utm_campaign" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="js-scroll-trigger" data-target="body" data-triggers="render-rebelbar" data-toggle-class="with-floating-shares" data-loaded="true" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /></span></font></p><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url" data-elid="2538558599" data-authors="DeSmogBlog" data-headline="Inside the Trump Admin's Fight to Keep the Keystone XL Approval Process Secret" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="body-description"><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By Steve Horn</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">At a <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Order%20on%20Confidentiality%20Order%20Hearing.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Feb. 21 hearing</a>, a U.S. District Court judge ruled that the Trump administration must either fork over documents showing how the U.S. Department of State reversed an earlier decision and ultimately came to approve the <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/5857" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Keystone XL pipeline</a>, or else provide a substantial legal reason for continuing to withhold them. The federal government has an <a href="https://apnews.com/2b64dbbfd05d4674972c64b8ec4cfd4d/Judge-orders-gov't-review-of-Keystone-pipeline-documents" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">order to deliver the goods</a>, one way or the other, by March 21.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">DeSmog has reviewed the court evidence from the environmental groups bringing the case, records which help illuminate their argument that the government is, in fact, withholding such documents. The judge will decide if those documents, legally, should be made public.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The case, which <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/IEN%20v.%20State%20Department%20Complaint.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">began in March 2017</a>, pits the Indigenous Environmental Network and the North Coast River Alliance against the State Department, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Department of interior and <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/5420" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">TransCanada</a>, the owner of Keystone XL. During his first week in office, <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/donald-trump" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Donald Trump</a> signed a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/presidential-memorandum-regarding-construction-keystone-xl-pipeline/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">memorandum</a>calling for the State Department to perform an expedited 60-day permit review of the pipeline. Two months later, the State Department gave Keystone XL the <a href="https://keystonepipeline-xl.state.gov/documents/organization/269323.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">permit it needed</a> to cross the U.S.-Canada border.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Under the Obama administration, the Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry oil from Alberta's <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/2632" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">tar sands</a>, underwent a years-long environmental review process which culminated in President Barack Obama <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2015/11/06/victory-obama-rejects-scandal-ridden-keystone-xl-tar-sands-pipeline" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">nixing it in November 2015</a>. For the better part of the past decade, the pipeline has served as a central mobilizing force for the environmental movement.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Dispute Over Records</font></strong></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">At the center of this case is a dispute over the administrative records of federal agencies, which in other lawsuits are routinely made public as part of the pre-trial process.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Generally, releasing such documents gives a snapshot of the full deliberative process behind federal agencies' decisions. DeSmog, in fact, <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2015/04/20/emails-state-department-secretly-approved-expansion-enbridge-keystone-xl-clone" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">published a story on such documents</a> in 2015 related to a different tar sands pipeline project, which involved Enbridge's <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/12487" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Alberta Clipper</a> (also known as Line 67), part of a broader pipeline system DeSmog calls the "<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/17587" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Keystone XLClone</a>."</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In the TransCanada case, the State Department has argued for keeping these pre-trial records sealed while the plaintiffs, the environmental groups, have argued they should be made public. These documents, which might include emails and memos, would offer the plaintiffs and the general public an idea of how the Trump administration decided to approve the Keystone XL.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="text-align: center;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The plaintiffs say that not all of those records have been turned over.</font></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Federal Defendants have wrongly omitted an unknown number of emails and other internal communications considered by the agencies during their review of the Keystone XL pipeline," the plaintiffs in the case argued in court documents on Jan. 8.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In an <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Declaration%20of%20Cecilia%20Segal%20.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">affidavit exhibited</a> as part of that filing, Cecilia Segal, an attorney for one of the plaintiffs, cited a Dec. 19 phone call she had with the federal defendants, in which they said that agency emails and other records do not need to be disclosed as part of the case.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Another letter exhibited as part of the Jan. 8 filing, <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/CBD%20Nov%2030%20Letter.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">written on Nov. 30 by attorneys</a> for the Center for Biological Diversity, further complained that the documents already handed over were not adequately comprehensive or organized in a manner useful for the case. And many documents, they allege, seem to be missing entirely and without explanation.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"We are concerned that both the State Department and Service have withheld records as privileged without identifying and certifying them on a privilege log," wrote the attorneys.</font></p></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.edf.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Environmental Defense Fund</a> (EDF) has obtained emails indicating U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style="text-decoration-line: none;">EPA</a>) Administrator <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/scott-pruitt" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Scott Pruitt</a>'s personal involvement in efforts to <a href="https://www.edf.org/media/environmental-defense-fund-obtains-information-over-1900-climate-related-items-removed-or" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">remove information</a> about <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">climate change</a>from EPA's website.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EDF obtained the emails from EPA in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. We have posted <a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">the files</a> for easy public access.</font></p><div id="AdThrive_Content_1_desktop" class="adthrive-ad adthrive-dynamic adthrive-content" data-google-query-id="CLSI_r-ugNkCFUvCwAod9jsCmQ" style="text-align: left; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; min-height: 100px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow-x: visible !important;"><div id="google_ads_iframe_18190176/AdThrive_Content_1/58d2e52b44e6236dc5819ee2_0container" style="border: 0pt none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The emails center on a website purge at EPA in April 2017. Along with webpages about climate change and climate science, the purge removed the webpage about the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/clean-power-plan" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Clean Power Plan</a>—the most significant action that the U.S. has ever taken to address climate change, and one that Pruitt is now attempting to repeal</font></div><div id="google_ads_iframe_18190176/AdThrive_Content_1/58d2e52b44e6236dc5819ee2_0container" style="border: 0pt none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/04/28/epa-website-removes-climate-science-site-from-public-view-after-two-decades/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">website purge</a> undermined access to information about the Clean Power Plan's immense benefits for climate and public health, as well as supporting materials about the rule's legal and technical underpinnings. The public comment period for Pruitt's proposal to repeal the Clean Power Plan is ongoing.</font></div></div><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The disappearance of these key web pages makes it harder for the public to access vital information about climate change and public health, including information about the Clean Power Plan," said EDF attorney <a href="https://www.edf.org/people/ben-levitan" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Ben Levitan</a>. "Obscuring information thwarts meaningful public participation in EPA's work to protect Americans' health and safety. It reinforces serious concerns that Pruitt has predetermined that he will repeal the Clean Power Plan, and that the current rulemaking process is a sham."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Since the website purge, the URL for the Clean Power Plan webpage redirects visitors to <a href="https://www.epa.gov/energy-independence" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">this webpage</a> featuring President <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Trump</a>'s "Energy Independence" executive order.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The newly released emails indicate that Pruitt was personally engaged in the website changes.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In early April 2017, Lincoln Ferguson, a senior adviser to Pruitt, asked in an email:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"How close are we to launching this on the website? The Administrator would like it to go up ASAP. He also has several other changes that need to take place." (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 2</a>, p. 23)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">J.P. Freire, then serving as Pruitt's Associate Administrator for Public Affairs, responded:</font></p><p /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">"You can tell him we … are just finishing up." (</span><a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" text-decoration-line="text-decoration-line" none="none">File 2</a><span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">, p. 23)</span></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Ferguson later wrote back:</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Can it happen today?" (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 2</a>, p. 26)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="text-align: center;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Ferguson also followed up to emphasize Pruitt's personal involvement:</font></span></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Just asking because he is asking …" (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 2</a> p. 23)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Freire was emphatic that all Clean Power Plan references should link to the new page about Trump's executive order. In a discussion about the new page, he wrote:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"This looks great, and should be on the page for the Clean Power Plan. Any reference to the Clean Power Plan, any link to it, should redirect here." (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-01-05-2018" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 2</a>, p. 23)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The emails also suggest EPA staff were directed to manipulate search results. Website visitors searching for information about the Clean Power Plan would be diverted to the page promoting Trump's executive order—instead of what they were actually looking for.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In one conversation, an EPA staff member stated, "I've been asked about search results for the term 'Clean Power Plan.'" A colleague responded:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"We can make the Energy Independence homepage a 'Best Bet' and thus the first result for Clean Power Plan for our EPA Search engine if you request it." (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-12-08-2017" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 1</a>, p. 84)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A separate conversation among EPA staff demonstrated just how determined J.P. Freire was to undermine access to the Clean Power Plan webpage.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">An EPA staff member recounted a discussion with a colleague about Clean Power Plan search results:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"[S]he said JP wanted to know if ALL of those pages could be redirected." (<a href="https://www.edf.org/content/foia-partial-production-12-08-2017" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">File 1</a>, p. 298)</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The changes are particularly harmful considering the ongoing public comment period on Pruitt's proposed repeal of the Clean Power Plan. The website purge has obscured the public's access to information about the rule's purpose and its tremendous benefits for public health and climate security, impeding commenters' ability to consider and incorporate this important information. The selective restriction of information availability further increases concerns about Pruitt's objectivity when determining the fate of the Clean Power Plan.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The removed webpages are still accessible through various EPA archives, but the archives are a poor substitute. They do not appear in a search of the EPA website. They are harder to find with certain search engines, including Google. And they are no longer being updated, which is especially problematic for cutting-edge pages like EPA's overview of climate science.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The website purge fits Pruitt's troubling pattern of ruling EPA under a cloak of secrecy, which is no way to run an agency entrusted with protecting the public health and environment. As part of EDF's commitment to shining a light on EPA actions, we are making these records easily available to the public. Members of the public may contact EDF with any observations after viewing the records.</font></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed" style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p><div class="around-the-web" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><ul class="around-the-weblist" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style: none;" /></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">yikes, longterm damage:</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/right-wing/senate-republicans-want-speed-approval-trumps-nutty-nominees">https://www.alternet.org/right-wing/senate-republicans-want-speed-approval-trumps-nutty-nominees</a></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">'s one of those stories that might be a minor issue in a normal presidential administration but takes on alarming implications in the era of Donald Trump: </span><a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/366260-senate-gop-seeks-to-change-rules-for-trump-picks" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-line: none;">The Hill reports that Senate Republicans</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> under <b>Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are considering changing the rules for confirming appointees to both federal agencies and the district courts, drastically reducing the amount of time that senators get to question the people Trump wants to entrust with these powerful positions.</b></span></font></p><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Republicans are considering shrinking debate for non-Cabinet federal nominees down from 30 hours to just eight, and limiting debate on district judges to <em>two hours apiece.</em></font></p></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">To be clear, it's not that unusual to shorten debate time on nominations, and Senate Democrats made a similar rule change in 2013 — though only for that session of Congress. The current proposal, offered by Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., would be a more permanent change so that rubber-stamping Trump nominees could be the practice not just this year but for as long as Trump holds office. </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">But the larger concern is not just that this would be a long-term rules change being proposed, but who, exactly, would benefit: A president who has been quite clear that incompetence is no obstacle to nomination -- and that being opposed to the mission of the office you wish to run is a bonus.</span></font></p></div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"What we need is not less time, but more time, based on what we’ve seen over and over," Sasha Buchert, <a href="https://www.lambdalegal.org/about-us/staff/sasha-buchert" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">a staff attorney at Lambda Legal</a>, told Salon. "The judicial nominees we’ve seen are so bad, and every day there’s something new that’s revealed. It’s a similar issue with the executive nominations, unfortunately."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">With Senate Republicans eager to simply vote in everyone Trump tosses their way, the only way to stop at least some of the worst nominees is to make the confirmation process a public spectacle that forces withdrawal from sheer embarrassment. <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-judicial-nominee-matthew-petersen_us_5a37ec14e4b0ff955ad51e82" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Buchert pointed to cases like that of Matthew Petersen</a>, who withdrew his nomination to be a district judge after the confirmation hearing exposed that he was incapable of answering basic questions most first-year law students could handle.</font></p><div><div id="postSection-3"><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Buchert also flagged the case of Eric Dreiband, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/01/politics/eric-dreiband-justice-department-civil-rights-lgbt/index.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">a lawyer who spent his career defending employers in discrimination cases</a>, whom Trump nominated to be the head of the Justice Department's civil rights division. The longer confirmation process gave human rights groups time to raise the alarm and so far, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/01/03/575123392/key-vacancies-at-justice-department-not-a-recipe-for-good-government" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Dreiband's confirmation seems stalled</a>. But shortening debate might make it easier for troublesome nominees to slide through.</font></p></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Drew McConville, a senior managing director at <a href="https://wilderness.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">The Wilderness Society</a>, linked the proposal to limit debate to the Trump administration's larger<b>hostility toward any kind of public accountability.</b></font></p></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>"Time after time, we’re seeing the administration look to undermine opportunities for public input," McConville said. “Unfortunately, the administration has shown itself in the first year to put special interests above the public interest.”</b></font></p></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">McConville noted that over the past year, environmental activists have documented a downturn in <a href="https://www.nhonews.com/news/2017/may/16/short-public-comment-period-bears-ears-review-coul/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">public comment opportunities</a>, <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/states-to-revive-climate-panel-disbanded-by-trump/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">the disbanding of advisory committees</a>, and an apparent decision to ignore public opinion on issues like protecting national monuments — in favor of doing whatever oil and gas companies want. Instead, a cult of secrecy has become ingrained in the Trump administration, particularly at the <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-24/western-monuments-set-to-be-reduced-under-proposal-to-trump" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Interior Department</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/11/us/politics/scott-pruitt-epa.html?r=0" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">the EPA</a>, and the public is being shut out of important decisions that affect it directly.</font></p></div></div></div><div><div id="postSection-5"><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The fact that the GOP Senate conference is reacting to Trump's comically unqualified nominees by streamlining the process really should end 'When will Republicans start standing up to Trump?' discussions," said Scott Lemieux, a political science lecturer at the University of Washington.</font></p></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">He added that "getting conservative judges and executive branch nominees is the main thing Republicans -- both legislators and voters -- are getting from Trump," saying this attempt to fast-track the process "was probably overdetermined."</font></p></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Republicans argue that the change is necessary because Trump is lagging behind his predecessors when it comes to getting appointees confirmed, at least to the federal agencies.<b> (He's getting <a href="https://time.com/5066679/donald-trump-federal-judges-record/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">his judicial nominees confirmed at breakneck speed already</a>.)</b></font></p></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"As of Thursday, the Trump administration has had 300 nominations confirmed by the Senate, with an additional 177 currently working their way through the upper chamber's pipeline," The Hill reports. "That lags behind former President Obama who had 418 nominations confirmed by the Senate at the same time, while former President George W. Bush had 493 and former President Clinton had 471."</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">But while Republicans want to blame Democrats for this, the reality is far more complicated. As NPR reports, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/01/03/575123392/key-vacancies-at-justice-department-not-a-recipe-for-good-government" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">the Trump administration has failed</a> to file paperwork quickly and completely, which is hanging up a lot of nominees. Also, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-appointee-tracker/database/?utm_term=.194d0793ee7d" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">as The Washington Post tracker indicates</a>, a huge part of the problem is that the administration isn't too hasty with its nominations, either. By this point in his presidency, Obama had sent 640 nominations to the Senate. George W. Bush had sent 616. Trump has only sent 477 so far.</font></p></div></div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div id="postSection-6" style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Still, the larger issue is competence. Trump has an unmistakable tendency to pick appointees who oppose the mission of the agency they are slated to manage. In many cases, these picks have been laughably unqualified. Sam Clovis, Trump's initial pick to be chief scientist at the USDA (now withdrawn), <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/08/28/trump-nominated-a-climate-denier-as-usda-chief-scientist-heres-why-that-matters/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">is not a scientist of any kind and had no experience with agriculture whatsoever</a>. His pick to head NASA, Jim Bridenstine, <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/11/10/trumps-terrible-nasa-nominee-and-the-gop-attack-on-science/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">has no background in science or engineering</a>. That Trump isn't nominating people quickly is probably a good thing on the whole, since so many of the people he does pick clearly have no idea what they're doing.</font></div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div id="postSection-7"><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“These positions matter," McConville said. "We’re talking about public officials who are entrusted with stewarding our public lands, protecting the air we breathe, the water we drink and so much more.”</font></p></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But as with the tax reform bill, it's clear that congressional Republicans are less interested in doing something well than in cramming through a right-wing agenda at breakneck speed. It's almost as if they don't think they will get a full four-year term to enact the Trump agenda and are making this a rush job, which may not be an unreasonable assumption when the headlines are dominated by the slowly unfolding Russia scandal and Trump's dubious mental state.</font></p></div></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">ppl power ~ big data?</font></p><h1 class="widgetheadline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; cursor: pointer; overflow-wrap: break-word; line-height: 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a class="widgetheadline-text custom-post-headline" href="https://www.ecowatch.com/blockchain-technology-2519373206.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">How Blockchain Technology Could Transform the Food Industry</font></a></h1><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url expanded" data-elid="2519373206" data-authors="The Conversation" data-headline="How Blockchain Technology Could Transform the Food Industry" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="body-description"><div class="widgetbrief"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By Sylvain Charlebois</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">There has been a lot of noise on cryptocurrencies and <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/bitcoin-massive-energy-hog-2515656910.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Bitcoin</a> of late. While some <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurencoleman/2017/12/17/why-the-massive-fears-around-cryptocurrency-will-rise-and-whats-next-for-2018/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">suggest</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/13/bitcoin-fraud-jp-morgan-cryptocurrency-drug-dealers" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">cryptocurrencies are a fraud</a>, others believe them to be the next <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/10/18/ico-cryptocurrency-coin-market-blockchain/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">biggest economic revolution</a> the world has seen since the internet. Bitcoin has brought to light blockchain technology, which offers great potential for food safety and verification in the agrifood sector. Yet it is far from being the panacea for a range of issues affecting the industry—at least for now.</font></p></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Simply put, <a href="https://theconversation.com/demystifying-the-blockchain-a-basic-user-guide-60226" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">blockchain</a> technology is a way of storing and sharing information across a network of users in an open virtual space. Blockchain technology allows for users to look at all transactions simultaneously and in real-time. In food, for example, a retailer would know with whom his supplier has had dealings. Additionally, since transactions are not stored in any single location, it is almost impossible to hack the information.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For consumers, blockchain technology can make a difference. By reading a simple <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/the-curious-comeback-of-the-dreaded-qr-code/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">QR code</a> with a smartphone, data such as an animal's date of birth, use of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/antibiotics" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">antibiotics</a>, vaccinations and location where the livestock was harvested can easily be conveyed to the consumer.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/blockchain-technology-2519373206.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/blockchain-technology-2519373206.html</a></font></p></div></div></div><p style="text-align: left; padding: 5px 0px; margin: 5px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><h1 class="widgetheadline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; cursor: pointer; overflow-wrap: break-word; line-height: 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a class="widgetheadline-text custom-post-headline" href="https://www.ecowatch.com/national-parks-climate-action-plans-2519148976.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Nearly 100 Climate Action Plans for National Parks Removed From Website</font></a></h1><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url expanded" data-elid="2519148976" data-authors="Lorraine Chow" data-headline="Nearly 100 Climate Action Plans for National Parks Removed From Website" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="body-description"><div class="widgetbrief"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Climate change</a> is a major challenge to America's beloved <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/national-parks" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Parks</a>—from hotter, drier conditions that can spark intense <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildfires" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">wildfires</a> that can permanently alter Yosemite's landscapes, to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/sea-level-rise" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">sea level rise</a> triggered by warming temperatures that threaten the Everglades.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In fact, nearly 100 parks have been preparing for and adapting to the damaging effects of climate change for years under the National Park Service's "Climate Friendly Parks Program" (CFP). However, you'll no longer be able to easily find these well-documented efforts to reduce emissions and move to more sustainable operations—that's because their work has been completely scrubbed from the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170921155412/https://www.nps.gov/subjects/climatechange/cfpprogram.htm" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Climate Friendly Parks Program website</a>, a watchdog group has found.</font></p></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Nearly 100 documents describing national parks' climate action plans have been removed from the website, according to a new report from the <a href="https://envirodatagov.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Environmental Data and Governance Initiative</a> (<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/edgi" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">EDGI</a>), which has been <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-climate-website-2498932391.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">closely tracking</a> the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Trump</a> administration's removal of climate change information from federal websites.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The page now states: "These documents are temporarily unavailable for download while we work to make them compliant with newly revised 2018 federal accessibility standards."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The researchers <a href="https://envirodatagov.org/climate-action-plans-for-national-parks-removed-from-site/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">found</a>:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"On December 7, 2017, all links to national park climate action plans were removed from a list of 97 member parks on the the CFP website. As described in our <a href="https://envirodatagov.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/AAR-6-NPS-Climate-Action-Plans-171221.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Website Access Assessment Report</a>, 92 of the links led to park climate action plan documents, two led to corresponding webpages about park 'sustainability' efforts, which are still live, and the remaining three listed parks have not had corresponding links since <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20151007215539/http://www.nps.gov/subjects/climatechange/cfpprogram.htm" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">October 7, 2015</a>. By December 20, all 92 of the corresponding linked documents had been removed from their respective URLs and were no longer hosted on the CFP website."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Check out the comparisons below:...</font></p></div></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-environmental-policy-changes-2518440716.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-environmental-policy-changes-2518440716.html</a></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">2. The Failure: Scrubbing Climate Change Data</font></strong></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Even before Inauguration Day, scientists began worrying that important information on climate change could soon disappear from government websites. Multiple groups <a href="https://www.wired.com/2017/01/rogue-scientists-race-save-climate-data-trump/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">staged hackathons</a> to preserve data and webpages from the EPA as well as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in accessible places like the <a href="https://archive.org/index.php" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Internet Archive</a> data refuge.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">So when information on—and even references to—climate change did indeed begin disappearing from government websites shortly after Trump's inauguration, scientists and engaged citizens were ready. Groups like the <a href="https://envirodatagov.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Environmental Data & Governance Initiative</a> have been watching the administration like hawks, monitoring changes to government agencies and keeping public environmental data, well, public, even as the current administration is determined not to.</font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/marine-sanctuaries-secret-report-2505498028.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/marine-sanctuaries-secret-report-2505498028.html</a></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div class="headline-container" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><h1 class="headline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px; padding: 0px; position: relative; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Marine Sanctuaries: The Secret Report the White House Doesn’t Want You to Read</font></h1></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="js-scroll-trigger" data-target="body" data-triggers="render-rebelbar" data-toggle-class="with-floating-shares" data-loaded="true" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /></span></font><div id="utm_campaign" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url" data-elid="2505498028" data-authors="Surfrider Foundation" data-headline="Marine Sanctuaries: The Secret Report the White House Doesn’t Want You to Read" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px;"><div class="body-description"><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By Pete Stauffer</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It's a simple choice, really. Do we want our National Marine Sanctuaries to be used for recreation, education, fishing and ecological protection? Or do we want to hand these ocean gems over the oil and gas industry so they can expand <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/offshore-oil-drilling" style="text-decoration-line: none;">offshore drilling</a> off our coasts?</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For the past six months, the federal administration has been studying this very question. Following the Trump administration's <a href="http://www.surfrider.org/coastal-blog/entry/trump-signs-executive-order-to-expand-offshore-oil-drilling" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Executive Order</a>: <em>The America First Energy Strategy</em>, the Department of Commerce began a review of five National Marine Sanctuaries (including all four off California's coast) and six Marine Monuments to determine if these sites might be exploited for energy development. As part of the process, they invited the public to share their thoughts on the matter. The input received was unequivocal: don't mess with our sanctuaries!</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>According to an <a href="https://blog.marine-conservation.org/2017/08/overwhelming-support-for-marine-monuments-and-sanctuaries.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">analysis</a> by the <a href="https://marine-conservation.org/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Marine Conservation Institute</a>, roughly 99 percent of public comments collected at regulations.gov expressed support for maintaining Marine Sanctuaries and Monuments as they currently exist. In all, nearly 100,000 citizens spoke out on the issue,</b> demonstrating broad and diverse support for sanctuaries including Channel Islands, Monterey Bay, Cordell Bank and the Greater Farallones. Moreover, seven coastal counties in California, from Ventura to Humboldt, passed resolutions affirming local government support for Sanctuaries.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This brings us to the secret report. On Oct. 25, <b>Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/10/27/trump-gets-report-that-could-open-national-marine-sanctuaries-to-oil-drilling/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">submitted</a> his recommendations to President Trump on National Marine Sanctuaries and Monuments</b> based on the agency's review of the issue. The only problem? No one from the public is allowed to read it. Yes, that's right. Despite a review process ostensibly based on public input, the administration's plans for our National Marine Sanctuaries are being kept a secret.</font></span></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">One might assume that no action will be taken against Marine Sanctuaries, based on the overwhelming public support expressed. Yet, given the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/10/27/trump-says-he-will-shrink-bears-ears-national-monument-a-sacred-tribal-site-in-utah/?utm_term=.67b763df9c03&wpisrc=al_environment__alert-hse&wpmk=1" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">recent news</a> that protections for National Monuments will be scaled back by the administration, following similar (and equally overwhelming) public sentiment expressed, it's clear that the risk is very real. Add the fact that the report is being kept under wraps, and the urgency of the matter becomes even more clear.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p></div></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/earthjustice-sues-federal-agencies-2505939690.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/earthjustice-sues-federal-agencies-2505939690.html</a></font></p><div class="headline-container" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><h1 class="headline h1" style="text-align: left; margin: 10px; padding: 0px; position: relative; line-height: 31px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Fate of National Monuments Remains Shrouded in Secrecy: Earthjustice Sues Federal Agencies for Withholding Information From Public</font></h1></div><div id="utm_campaign" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="js-scroll-trigger" data-target="body" data-triggers="render-rebelbar" data-toggle-class="with-floating-shares" data-loaded="true" style="margin-top: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /></span></font></p><div class="body js-expandable clearfix js-listicle-body js-update-url" data-elid="2505939690" data-authors="Earthjustice" data-headline="Fate of National Monuments Remains Shrouded in Secrecy: Earthjustice Sues Federal Agencies for Withholding Information From Public" style="margin: 10px; line-height: 24px;"><div class="body-description"><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For months, the Interior Department, Bureau of Land Management and the White House Council on Environmental Quality have repeatedly failed to answer the public's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for information related to the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Trump</a> administration's <a href="http://email.prnewswire.com/wf/click?upn=n5ev07v3cJt0VZHKGHPmh-2FA8YRzh1iYwLSo1Lz8Ubytl6LzK3Z0ZQlsfMkqOSreu3xP8Sq1oJgDmy-2Bg3mTIMH6fZ-2BZM-2BY-2BWEZRmEuFcTfBmagX3-2BwmtYfuWoFHM2GAxv2YaBndEWfNakC2DxmVwIAKC4W2I3T6wZVUCTvQbDF-2FC7uLZfpMGxCsCRQ12A-2BMBwVBMbIXI-2FROVDiwmBKxYI-2BzsqsdkpnIvBnMcXvdoR6dmvjorHbl21Nx1TVYr87G-2Fj_x-2B8b7bjSgm7PP2pr2-2BBei8tMe7aWJwPQx2ba2DAiMBtwlTMpFE1kltRKbCxHSMYJt7KR3xj1j4LwJRRAhW-2Bvq9LOFZmIXAxA0Tho728a43bYhpC1rL2QR3t4g-2FcgTSpYlCYd9gFNsqE975krcAobQTl-2F-2BNuKoIPM-2FBZztU-2FGnEEoDZDr" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">ongoing review</a> of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/national-monuments" style="text-decoration-line: none;">national monuments</a>—protected federal <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-lands" style="text-decoration-line: none;">lands</a> and waters that belong to the American people.</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">The review of the country's national monuments has been marked by a lack of transparency—Interior Sec. <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ryan-zinke" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Ryan Zinke</a> has yet to disclose how he incorporated input from Native American tribes and the 2.8 million Americans who urged protections for national monuments in the public comment period into his <a href="http://email.prnewswire.com/wf/click?upn=n5ev07v3cJt0VZHKGHPmh-2FA8YRzh1iYwLSo1Lz8Ubytl6LzK3Z0ZQlsfMkqOSreu3xP8Sq1oJgDmy-2Bg3mTIMH6fZ-2BZM-2BY-2BWEZRmEuFcTfBmagX3-2BwmtYfuWoFHM2GAxv2YaBndEWfNakC2DxmVwIAKC4W2I3T6wZVUCTvQbDF-2FC7uLZfpMGxCsCRQ12A-2BMBwVBMbIXI-2FROVDiwmBKxYI-2BxzWYXKeXZJn9S4qW2qIrozdqYHyKsgVNcjxnN8ki9tZ_x-2B8b7bjSgm7PP2pr2-2BBei8tMe7aWJwPQx2ba2DAiMBtwlTMpFE1kltRKbCxHSMYJt7KR3xj1j4LwJRRAhW-2Bvq9LOFZmIXAxA0Tho728a43bYhpC1rL2QR3t4g-2FcgTSpYlCYd9gFNsqE975krcAobQTl-2F-2BNuKoIPM-2FBZztU-2FGnEEt0cGtdd" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">leaked draft recommendations</a> to shrink monuments and gut their protections. On Thursday, <a href="https://earthjustice.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Earthjustice</a> filed a lawsuit on behalf of six organizations whose requests for information on national monuments have been met with radio silence.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The Trump administration continues its onslaught against America's national monuments, hoping to cover up its misdeeds by blocking public access to information crucial to the protection of these iconic places," said Yvonne Yuting Chi, an attorney in Earthjustice's Rocky Mountains office. "National monuments preserve America's historical heritage, stunning wilderness, geologic wonders, and priceless cultural sites—and they're meant to be protected for future generations under the Antiquities Act. But the Trump administration wants to pretend that the laws of the land have changed. The American people have the right to know the fate of these magnificent places that belong to all of us, and we are taking these agencies to court to get answers."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"It's important that the public knows who had the White House and Interior Department's ear to push the president to dismantle <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/bears-ears" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Bears Ears</a> and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments," said Stephen Bloch, legal director for the Salt Lake City-based <a href="https://suwa.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance</a>. "We also expect this lawsuit will shed light on the information and factors the White House Council on Environmental Quality and Interior Department considered as part of Secretary Zinke's 'monuments review' and that led him to recommend eviscerating Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments, a decision that would place irreplaceable cultural and public natural resources at risk of damage and destruction."</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Earthjustice is representing the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, <a href="https://www.nrdc.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Natural Resources Defense Council</a>, <a href="http://wilderness.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">The Wilderness Society</a>, <a href="https://www.grandcanyontrust.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Grand Canyon Trust</a>, <a href="http://sierraclub.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Sierra Club</a>,</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">and </span><a href="http://www.greatoldbroads.org/" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-line: none;">Great Old Broads for Wilderness</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> in this lawsuit to compel the agencies to respond to seven FOIA requests, most of which have been overdue for months. The </span><a href="http://email.prnewswire.com/wf/click?upn=n5ev07v3cJt0VZHKGHPmh-2FA8YRzh1iYwLSo1Lz8Ubytl6LzK3Z0ZQlsfMkqOSreu3xP8Sq1oJgDmy-2Bg3mTIMH6fZ-2BZM-2BY-2BWEZRmEuFcTfBmagX3-2BwmtYfuWoFHM2GAxv2YaBndEWfNakC2DxmVwIAKC4W2I3T6wZVUCTvQbDF-2FC7uLZfpMGxCsCRQ12A-2BMBwVBMbIXI-2FROVDiwmBKxYI-2Bxyc-2Fa9nFJCASoe-2FykoDphPvCMr7SznQomx0XeeApcto_x-2B8b7bjSgm7PP2pr2-2BBei8tMe7aWJwPQx2ba2DAiMBtwlTMpFE1kltRKbCxHSMYJt7KR3xj1j4LwJRRAhW-2Bvq9LOFZmIXAxA0Tho728a43bYhpC1rL2QR3t4g-2FcgTSpYlCYd9gFNsqE975krcAobQTl-2F-2BNuKoIPM-2FBZztU-2FGnEHW5K" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-line: none;">complaint</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> alleges that the agencies have failed to meet their response deadlines under the FOIA and have repeatedly rejected or ignored these organizations' inquiries on their requests' status.</span></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"If Interior Secretary Zinke's 'first step' before telling the president to ravage the Bears Ears National Monument was, as he claims, to 'gather the facts,'" said Aaron Paul, a staff attorney with the Grand Canyon Trust, "why are our months-old requests for those already-gathered facts still unanswered when federal law gives the secretary 20 days to respond? It's a shame that we have to turn to the courts to force the secretary to deliver the transparency that the Freedom of Information Act secures for the American public."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The public deserves to know what Secretary Zinke is recommending for the future of our public lands," said Dan Ritzman, lands, water and wildlife director for Sierra Club's Our Wild America campaign. "The Trump administration's secrecy suggests Zinke is aware that stripping protections from our public lands and monuments is as unpopular as raising fees for the public to enjoy them."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Since 1967, the <a href="http://email.prnewswire.com/wf/click?upn=n5ev07v3cJt0VZHKGHPmh-2FA8YRzh1iYwLSo1Lz8Ubytl6LzK3Z0ZQlsfMkqOSreu3xP8Sq1oJgDmy-2Bg3mTIMH6fZ-2BZM-2BY-2BWEZRmEuFcTfBmagX3-2BwmtYfuWoFHM2GAxv2YaBndEWfNakC2DxmVwIAKC4W2I3T6wZVUCTvQbDF-2FC7uLZfpMGxCsCRQ12A-2BMBwVBMbIXI-2FROVDiwmBKxYI-2B-2F-2Bucq0uLCZ9r6Q9RkD3C0wAPAFUjAS8xHjvj-2BJzaYA0_x-2B8b7bjSgm7PP2pr2-2BBei8tMe7aWJwPQx2ba2DAiMBtwlTMpFE1kltRKbCxHSMYJt7KR3xj1j4LwJRRAhW-2Bvq9LOFZmIXAxA0Tho728a43bYhpC1rL2QR3t4g-2FcgTSpYlCYd9gFNsqE975krcAobQTl-2F-2BNuKoIPM-2FBZztU-2FGnEHT" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">FOIA</a> has provided the public the right to request access to records from any federal agency. It is a law that keeps the American people in the know about their government. When a member of the public lodges a request with a federal agency under the FOIA, the agency must promptly disclose any information requested unless the information falls under one of the nine exemptions protecting interests such as personal privacy, national security and law enforcement.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"We are dismayed that it takes litigating FOIA requests to learn the fate of public lands that belong to all Americans," said Caroline Munger, Board Chair for Great Old Broads for Wilderness. "This cloak and dagger approach by the current administration on revealing the fate of these national monuments shows a disdain for the law and the legacy of our protected wild lands. Monument proponents like Broads, tribal nations, and others have committed to a long legal battle, if necessary, to protect the Antiquities Act and monuments created under it."</font></p></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">omg why?</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/disappointing-backwards-step-critics-blast-u-s-exit-from-global-oil-gas-anti-corruption-effort-2505846330.html"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.ecowatch.com/disappointing-backwards-step-critics-blast-u-s-exit-from-global-oil-gas-anti-corruption-effort-2505846330.html</font></a></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Bloomberg reported that the withdrawal comes after the</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/american-petroleum-institute" style="text-decoration-line: none;">American Petroleum Institute</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">,</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/exxon" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Exxon Mobil Corp</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">. and</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/chevron" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Chevron Corp</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">. lobbied against a similar regulation compelling U.S. energy and mining companies to disclose those payments, which</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">President Donald Trump</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">rolled back earlier this year.</span></font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"It's pretty disgraceful for the United States," Jana Morgan, director of <a href="http://www.publishwhatyoupay.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Publish What You Pay</a>, a coalition that urges financial transparency in the extractive industry, told Bloomberg. "Chinese state-owned oil companies and Russian state-owned oil companies" are disclosing payments.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"So you literally have American companies that are less transparent than Russian and Chinese state-owned enterprises," she said.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Democrats also criticized the decision. <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/international/358560-us-backs-out-of-global-oil-anti-corruption-effort" target="_blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">The Hill</a> reported that the U.S. joined the agreement in 2011 after a joint effort from Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) and former Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.)....</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="4" face="Times New Roman"> =</font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">sum/update trump</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>secrecy fetish Signal app</b></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/election-2016/10-revelations-confirming-trumps-awfulness-those-who-resigned-his-administration">https://www.alternet.org/election-2016/10-revelations-confirming-trumps-awfulness-those-who-resigned-his-administration</a></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">trump rolls back: WH visitor logs and</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">secret ~ transparency</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-pruitt-bodyguards-2500198933.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-pruitt-bodyguards-2500198933.html</a></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">2mil$ sec team; sched secert</font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">==</span></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/08/window-dressing-exxon-reluctantly-crosses-climate-threshold">https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/08/window-dressing-exxon-reluctantly-crosses-climate-threshold</a></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;">
</div></div><div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;" open="Open"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The day before President Trump made his decision to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/01/trump-paris-climate-leave-fossil-fuels" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: 0px none;">pull the <span class="caps" style="">U.S.</span> out of the landmark Paris climate accord</a>, ExxonMobil reluctantly crossed a climate threshold.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;" open="Open"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A
majority of shareholders, over 62 percent, voted in favor of America’s
biggest oil company releasing detailed analyses of the risks that
climate change poses to its business. </font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;" open="Open"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Having previously argued that sufficient information is already being provided, <span class="caps" style="">CEO</span> Darren
Woods relented far enough to say that Exxon would “take the vote
seriously [and] will respond to that feedback and look for
opportunities” to communicate. Woods did not, however, agree to produce a
requested report. </font></p></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font></p><header class="headline_block span24">
<h2 class="slug" style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA</font></h2> <h1 class="headline " style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Ex-staffer: Climate website removal 'declaration of war'</font></h1><section class="byline" style="text-align: left;">
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><time datetime="2017-06-26 07:50:51 -0400">Published: Monday, June 26, 2017</time></font></section>
</header><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><section class="span16"> <section class="content">
<p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">U.S. EPA's decision to scrap its climate change website amounts to "a declaration of war," according to one of the scientists
who managed the site for more than five years.</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jason Samenow, who worked at the agency before becoming <em>The Washington Post</em>'s weather editor, wrote in the <em>Post</em>
that EPA's site lasted through 20 years of both Republican and
Democratic administrations because it mirrored findings from the
mainstream scientific community, including the government's own
researchers.</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Yet [EPA Administrator Scott] Pruitt, a lawyer who has spent much
of his career fighting climate change mitigation efforts, decided that
he knows more than the thousands of scientists whose decades of work
support this conclusion," Samenow wrote.</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The agency has said it's "updating" the site but hasn't offered a
timetable for doing so. It has archived the site without replacing it,
though some cities are now hosting the information on their own sites (<a href="https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060056321/"><em>Climatewire</em></a>, June 21).</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">President George W. Bush's staff severely limited any updates to the
site, he wrote, but Pruitt's meddling is more drastic and "spiteful, as
if he simply couldn't abide knowing that the agency he leads was
publishing information he doesn't believe."</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">He continued: "Pruitt may not accept mainstream climate science
conclusions, but if he wanted to promote his alternative views, a much
more defensible and transparent action would have been to leave the site
up while posting his perspective as well. Instead, one of the world's
best climate science sites has vanished" (Jason Samenow, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/i-worked-on-the-epas-climate-change-website-its-removal-is-a-declaration-of-war/2017/06/22/735f0858-5697-11e7-a204-ad706461fa4f_story.html"><i>Washington Post</i></a>, June 22). <b>— AAA</b></font></p>
</section></section><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==
</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Cities resurrect scrubbed EPA climate data</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Published: Wednesday, June 21, 2017</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A group of cities is preserving years' worth of climate change data the Trump administration scrubbed from U.S. EPA's website.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Boston, Chicago and at least a dozen other cities are using their own municipal websites to host a broad range of research that has disappeared from the EPA website since April, including data drawn from ice core samples, tide gauges, pollen remains and other methods.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA also deleted the agency's responses to previous statements by Scott Pruitt, who served as Oklahoma's attorney general before President Trump tapped him to lead EPA. Details about carbon emissions and the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan were nixed, too.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">An EPA official said the changes reflect the agency's new leadership, and the EPA home page still links to a "snapshot" of the website as it appeared the day before Trump's inauguration.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Boston has framed its preservation of that information as a rebuke of Trump's pro-fossil-fuel agenda. "Here, in Boston, we know climate change is real and we will continue to take action to fight it," city officials wrote on the site (David Abel, Boston Globe, June 18). — AAA</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Burr pulls report:</font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/02/senate-torture-report-recall-justice-department-239077">http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/02/senate-torture-report-recall-justice-department-239077</a></font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><div>
<p times="times" new="new" line-height="line-height:" font-size="font-size:" background-color="background-color:" style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 344.859px 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Justice Department’s copy of the famed “torture report” from the Senate Intelligence Committee, which extensively detailed the CIA’s Bush-era detention and interrogation tactics, doesn’t appear to be returning to the Senate anytime soon.</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who chaired the Intelligence Committee when the panel produced the report in 2014, said Friday that she has confirmed the CIA, its inspector general and the director of national intelligence have returned their copies of the torture report to the Senate. Her successor as the Intelligence chair, Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), had asked the administration to return its copies to the Senate, where it could be blocked indefinitely from public view because Congress exempted itself from open records laws.</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p>
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</font><div style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">===</font></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">obama efforts rolled back by trump eg WH visit logs</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/trump-white-house-orders-federal-agencies-blow-requests-info-all-democrats">http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/trump-white-house-orders-federal-agencies-blow-requests-info-all-democrats</a></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><h2 class="yiv8822244868null" style="text-align: left; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 32.5px; outline: none; letter-spacing: -0.75px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://insideclimatenews.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=7c733794100bcc7e083a163f0&id=7d29f3845a&e=06876ede6b" style=" line-height: 1.2em; outline: none; word-wrap: break-word; font-weight: normal;">Exxon Fighting to Keep Public From Seeing 900,000 Pages of Documents in Oil Spill Lawsuit</a></font></h2><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5em; outline: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Oil giant ExxonMobil is seeking "unprecedented secrecy" by labeling nearly 900,000 pages of documents as confidential in a class action lawsuit over an oil pipeline rupture in Arkansas, an attorney said in a new court filing.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 22.5px; outline: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style=" line-height: 1.2em; outline: none;"><a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://insideclimatenews.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=7c733794100bcc7e083a163f0&id=538aac70c2&e=06876ede6b" style=" line-height: 1.2em; outline: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Read more</a>.</span></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">rfk2: </font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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<p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">last vestige of free media is ownership, but b2 changed. <b>clear ch and cumulus </b>(dixie chicks) Michael Powell gave waivers to overages. corp get up to 45% of</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">nation viewers and can have paper, tv and radio in same city 187</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>rules done in secrt w/ only 1 public mtg</b> led to protest (2.4 mil ltrs) . sen voted to halt, house about to but <b>delay </b>and lobbyists blocked vote; fed ct</font>
<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">rejected b/c of lack of "reasoned analysis"</font></p>
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