HORNER2 e & e
many bak? one 404?
SEE HORNER 3LEGAL SUPPRESSION nam map MOFO
SEE RULE 23 LEGAL/LEGISLATIVE SUPPRESSION
congrats evil feck on using foia, capt 719
exxon-texas-courts-critics-climate-crimes
guard uk
exxonMobil is attempting to use an unusual Texas law to target and intimidate its critics, claiming that lawsuits against the company over its long history of downplaying and denying the climate crisis violate the US constitution’s guarantees of free speech.
The US’s largest oil firm is asking the Texas supreme court to allow it to use the law, known as rule 202, to pursue legal action against more than a dozen California municipal officials. Exxon claims that in filing lawsuits against the company over its role in the climate crisis, the officials are orchestrating a conspiracy against the firm’s first amendment rights.
A US small-town mayor sued the oil industry. Then Exxon went after him
Read more](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/16/imperial-beach-california-exxon-mobil-climate-crisis)
The oil giant also makes the curious claim that legal action in the California courts is an infringement of the sovereignty of Texas, where the company is headquartered.
Eight California cities and counties have accused Exxon and other oil firms of breaking state laws by misrepresenting and burying evidence, including from its own scientists, of the threat posed by rising temperatures. The municipalities are seeking billions of dollars in compensation for damage caused by wildfires, flooding and other extreme weather events, and to meet the cost of building new infrastructure to prepare for the consequences of rising global temperatures.
Rule 202 in effect allows corporations to go on a fishing expedition for incriminating evidence. They are able to question individuals under oath and demand access to documents even before any legal action is filed against them.
Exxon wants to use the provision to force the California officials to travel to Texas to be questioned by the firm’s lawyers about what the company describes as “lawfare” – the misuse of the legal system for political ends.
Exxon claims in a petition to the Texas supreme court that it is entitled to question the officials in order to collect evidence of “potential violations of ExxonMobil’s rights in Texas to exercise its first amendment privileges” to say what it likes about climate science.
“The potential defendants’ lawfare is aimed at chilling the speech of not just ExxonMobil, but of other prominent members of the Texas energy sector on issues of public debate, in this case, climate change,” the company claims in its petition.
The oil giant’s critics say Exxon’s attempt to use claims of free speech to curtail the first amendment rights of others follows a pattern of harassment toward those who challenge the company’s claims about the climate crisis.
Patrick Parenteau, a law professor and former director of the Environmental Law Center at Vermont law school, has described the company’s move as “intimidation” intended to make “it cost a lot and be painful to take on Exxon” whether or not the company wins its case.
Greg Abbott made the unusual move of writing to the state supreme court to advocate on the behalf of Exxon. Photograph: Bob Daemmrich/Zuma Wire/Rex/Shutterstock
In a highly unusual move, Texas’s governor, Greg Abbott, has written to the all-Republican court – half of whose members he appointed – in support of Exxon. He accused the California litigants of attempting “to suppress the speech of eighteen Texas-based energy companies on the subject of climate and energy policies”.
“When out-of-state officials try to project their power across our border, as respondents have done by broadly targeting the speech of an industry crucial to Texas, they cannot use personal jurisdiction to scamper out of our courts and retreat across state lines,” Abbott wrote.
In backing its claim, Exxon’s petition to the Texas supreme court gives the example of the Oakland city attorney, Barbara Parker, who in 2017 “issued a press release seeking to stifle the speech of the Texas energy sector or, as she likes to refer to it, ‘BIG OIL’”.
The press release said: “It is past time to debate or question the reality of global warming … Just like BIG TOBACCO, BIG OIL knew the truth long ago and peddled misinformation to con their customers and the American public.”
Big oil and gas kept a dirty secret for decades. Now they may pay the price
Read more](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jun/30/climate-crimes-oil-and-gas-environment)
The company also names the then San Francisco city attorney, Dennis Herrera, because he accused fossil fuel companies of launching a “disinformation campaign to deny and discredit” the reality of global heating, and pledged to hold the companies responsible “to account”.
Exxon has, in addition, targeted an environmental lawyer in Boston, Matthew Pawa, who represents some of the California municipalities. The firm describes him as “an outspoken advocate of misusing government power to limit free speech” and alleges that Pawa “recruited” the California cities and counties to sue Exxon.
“Those lawsuits are an affront to the first amendment,” the company claims.
Naomi Oreskes, a Harvard professor and co-author of Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, said Exxon had a long history of attempting to bully its critics into silence.
“Now that the arguments have moved into the legal sphere, this feels to me like an extension of the sort of harassment, bullying and intimidation that we’ve seen in the scientific sphere for the last two decades,” she said.
Oreskes said that the legal strategy is also part of a broader public relations campaign to paint the company as a victim of radical environmentalists and opportunistic politicians when Exxon argues that it should be heralded for its efforts to combat the climate crisis.
“Exxon Mobil has for a long time now tried to make themselves out to be the victim, as if somehow they’re the innocent party here,” she said.
The Texas supreme court is considering the case after a lower court backed Exxon’s attempts to use rule 202 against the California officials. The ruling was later overturned on appeal.
The appeal court sympathised with Exxon by acknowledging “an impulse to safeguard an industry that is vital to Texas’s economic well-being” and saying that “lawfare is an ugly tool by which to seek the environmental policy changes” pursued by California municipalities. But the appeal court said the defendants did not have sufficient direct connection to Texas for the case to be heard in the state.
Exxon has ‘a track record of promoting half truths, misrepresentations and in some cases outright lies’
Naomi Oreskes
Exxon has tried to head off climate litigation before with lawsuits claiming that the attorney generals of Massachusetts and New York were violating the company’s rights by investigating it. Those moves were blocked by the Massachusetts supreme court and by a federal court.
If the Texas supreme court allows its rule 202 bid to proceed, Exxon might expect a more sympathetic hearing for its claims in a state court system that has shown deference to big oil.
Exxon is facing a barrage of other lawsuits across the US. A number accuse the company and other fossil fuel firms of breaching consumer protection laws by propagating misinformation about climate science.
Oreskes said Exxon went further than most other oil companies in seeking to hide the evidence of its own scientists collected about global heating and in running a disinformation campaign.
“They’re pushing their freedom of speech as an issue because more than any other company, it’s been proven by people like me and others that they have a track record of promoting half truths, misrepresentations and in some cases outright lies in the public sphere,” she said.
“This is so well documented that unless they can come up with some strategy to defend it, they’re in potentially pretty serious trouble.”
This story is published as part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of news outlets strengthening coverage of the climate story
a US small-town mayor sued the oil industry. Then Exxon went after him
This article is more than 2 years old
The mayor of Imperial Beach, California, says big oil wants him to drop the lawsuit demanding the industry pay for the climate crisis
Chris McGreal in Imperial Beach, California
Sat 16 Oct 2021
Serge Dedina is a surfer, environmentalist and mayor of Imperial Beach, a small working-class city on the California coast.
He is also, if the fossil fuel industry is to be believed, at the heart of a conspiracy to shake down big oil for hundreds of millions of dollars.
ExxonMobil and its allies have accused Dedina of colluding with other public officials across California to extort money from the fossil-fuel industry. Lawyers even searched his phone and computer for evidence he plotted with officials from Santa Cruz, a city located nearly 500 miles north of Imperial Beach.
The problem is, Dedina had never heard of a Santa Cruz conspiracy. Few people had.
“The only thing from Santa Cruz on my phone was videos of my kids surfing there,” Dedina said. “I love the fact that some lawyer in a really expensive suit, sitting in some horrible office trying to find evidence that we were in some kind of conspiracy with Santa Cruz, had to look at videos of my kids surfing.”
That’s where the laughter stopped.
The lawyers found no evidence to back up their claim. But that did not stop the industry from continuing to use its legal muscle to try to intimidate Dedina, who leads one of the poorest small cities in the region.
The mayor became a target after Imperial Beach filed a lawsuit against ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP and more than 30 other fossil-fuel companies demanding they pay the huge costs of defending the city from rising seas caused by the climate crisis.
Homes along the final stretch of Imperial Beach coast before reaching the border with Mexico. Photograph: John Francis Peters/The Guardian
Imperial Beach’s lawsuit alleges the oil giants committed fraud by covering up research showing that burning fossil fuels destroys the environment. The industry then lied about the evidence for climate change for decades, deliberately delaying efforts to curb carbon emissions.
The city’s lawsuit was among the first of a wave of litigation filed by two dozen municipalities and states across the US that could cost the fossil-fuel industry billions of dollars in compensation for the environmental devastation and the deception.
Dedina says his minority majority community of about 27,000 cannot begin to afford the tens of millions of dollars it will cost to keep at bay the waters bordering three sides of his financially strapped city. Th.. have turned Imperial Beach into an island.
One assessment calculated that, without expensive mitigation measures, rising sea levels will eventually swamp some of the city’s neighbourhoods, routinely flood its two schools and overwhelm its drainage system.
Imperial Beach’s annual budget is $20m. Exxon’s chief executive, Darren Woods, was paid more than $15m last year.
“We don’t have a pot to piss in in this city. So why not go after the oil companies?” he said. “The lawsuit is a pragmatic approach to making the people that caused sea level rise pay for the impacts it has on our city.”
That’s not how Exxon, the US’s largest oil company, saw it. Its lawyers noted that Imperial Beach filed its case in July 2017, at the same time as two California counties, Marin and San Mateo. The county and city of Santa Cruz followed six months later with similar suits seeking compensation to cope with increasing wildfires and drought caused by global heating.
Exxon alleged that the sudden burst of litigation, and the fact that the municipalities shared a law firm specialising in environmental cases, Sher Edling, was evidence of collusion.
Exxon filed lawsuits claiming the municipalities conspired to extort money from the company by following a strategy developed during an environmental conference at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, 25 miles north of Imperial Beach, nine years ago.
The meeting, organised by the Climate Accountability Institute and the Union of Concerned Scientists, produceda report outlining how legal strategies used by US states against the tobacco industry in the 1990s could be applied to cases against fossil fuel companies.
Dedina was also targeted by one of the US’s biggest business groups at the forefront of industry resistance to increased regulation to reduce greenhouse gases, the National Association of Manufacturers, and a rightwing thinktank, the Energy & Environment Legal Institute.
Mayor Dedina looks out to sea. Photograph: John Francis Peters/The Guardian
The manufacturing trade group was behind the efforts to obtain data from Dedina’s phone and documents in 2018. In its public disclosure request to the mayor’s office, NAM called Imperial Beach’s lawsuit “litigation based on political or ideological objections more appropriately addressed through the political process”.
Exxon is attempting to use a Texas law that allows corporations to go on a fishing expedition for incriminating evidence by questioning individuals under oath even before any legal action is filed against them. The company is trying to force Dedina, two other members of Imperial Beach’s government, and officials from other jurisdictions, to submit to questioning on the grounds they were joined in a conspiracy against the oil industry.
“A collection of special interests and opportunistic politicians are abusing law enforcement authority and legal process to impose their viewpoint on climate change,”the oil firm claimed. “ExxonMobil finds itself directly in that conspiracy’s crosshairs.”
[
How cities and states could finally hold fossil fuel companies accountable
Read more](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/jun/30/climate-crimes-fossil-fuels-cities-states-interactive)
A Texas district judge approved the request to depose Dedina, but then a court of appeals overturned the decision last year. The state supreme court is considering whether to take up the case.
The target on Dedina is part of a wider pattern of retaliation against those suing Exxon and other oil companies.
In an unusual move in 2016, Exxon persuaded a Texas judge to order the attorney general of Massachusetts, Maura Healey, to travel to Dallas to be deposed about her motives for investigating the company for alleged fraud for suppressing evidence on climate change. The judge also ordered that New York’s attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, be “available” in Dallas on the same day in case Exxon wanted to question him about a similar investigation.
Healey accused Exxon of trying to “squash the prerogative of state attorneys general to do their jobs”. The judge reversed the deposition order a month later and Healey filed a lawsuit against the company in 2019, which is still awaiting trial.
But similar tactics persuaded the US Virgin Islands attorney general to shut down his investigation of the oil giant.
Patrick Parenteau, a law professor and former director of the Environmental Law Center at Vermont law school, said the attempt to question Dedina and other officials is part of a broader strategy by the oil industry to counter lawsuits with its own litigation.
“These cases are frivolous and vexatious. Intimidation is the goal. Just making it cost a lot and be painful to take on Exxon. They think that if they make the case painful enough, Imperial Beach will quit,” he said.
The city’s lawsuit claims it faces a ‘significant and dangerous sea-level rise’. Photograph: John Francis Peters/The Guardian
If the intent is to kill off the litigation against the oil industry, it’s not working. Officials from other municipalities have called Exxon’s move “repugnant”, “a sham” and “outrageous”, and have vowed to press on with their lawsuits.
Dedina described the action as a “bullying tactic” by the oil industry to avoid accountability.
“The only conspiracy is [that] a bunch of suits and fossil-fuel companies decided to pollute the earth and make climate change worse, and then lie about it,” he said. “They make more money than our entire city has in a year.”
The city’s lawsuit claims it faces a “significant and dangerous sea-level rise” through the rest of this century that threatens its existence. Imperial Beachcommissioned an analysis of its vulnerability to rising sea levels which concluded that nearly 700 homes and businesses were threatened at a cost of more than $100m. It said that flooding will hit about 40% of the city’s roads, including some that will be under water for long periods. Two elementary schools will have to be moved. The city’s beach, regarded as one of the best sites for surfing on the California coast, is being eroded by about a foot a year.
Imperial Beach sits at the southern end of San Diego bay. Under one worst-case scenario, the bay could merge with the Tijuana River estuary to the south and permanently submerge much of the city’s housing and roads.
A view of the Tijuana River estuary. Photograph: John Francis Peters/The Guardian
The city has received some help with creating natural climate barriers. The Fish and Wildlife Service restored 400 acres of wetland next to the city as a national wildlife refuge which also acts as a barrier to flooding, and is expected to restore other wetlands together with the Port of San Diego. A grant is paying for improved equipment to warn of floods.
But that still leaves the huge costs of building new schools and drainage systems, and adapting other infrastructure. Dedina said that without the oil companies stumping up, it won’t happen.
“People ask, how did you go against the world’s largest fossil fuel companies? Isn’t that scary? No. What’s scary is coastal flooding and the idea that whole cities would be under water,” said the mayor.
“Honestly, bring it on. I can’t wait to make our case. I can’t wait to take the fight to them because we have nothing to lose.”
===
whoohoo win!
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/10/7/2127500/-WSJ-Mad-About-Anti-Climate-Disinfo-Efforts-As-CFACT-Pretends-Not-To-Be
WSJ Mad About Anti-Climate Disinfo Efforts, As CFACT Pretends Not To Be - Daily Kos
Daily Kos
We promise that next week it'll be back to bad news only here, but for the third day in a row we're going to do a bit of celebrating, because once again, deniers are losing!
Lesley Clark reported yesterday at E&E News that"Minnesota’s highest court has delivered a victory to Attorney General Keith Ellison in legal action surrounding the state’s climate liability lawsuit against the oil and gas industry."
More specifically, the Minnesota Supreme Court decided not to let tobacco-turned-fossil-fuel-backed lawyer and harasser of climate scientists and public servants Chris Horner's front group try and recreate Climategate, but this time with emails from Attorney General Keith Ellison's office concerning their litigation against fossil fuel companies.
Meanwhile, it was heartening to see that CFACT is so desperate for signs of its effectiveness that it's emailing people to brag about the "six hit pieces referencing [Marc] Morano since July."
Two of those are from MediaMatters, one where Morano is mentioned by name only once, in passing, and another where his appearance was noted in a larger piece on Tucker Carlson. The other four are from yours truly, who CFACT describes as seeming "to have a love-hate relationship" with Morano.
Which is true, in that we love how easy it is Morano makes it to write about how deniers are wrong on purpose for money by constantly saying dumb stuff, like that some 1930's New Deal book is proof of a 2022 plot for world domination through a Great Reset. The other example they linked also only mentioned Morano in passing, as one of many disinfo-spreaders proving YouTube is failing to enforce its demonetization policy. Not exactly evidence of effectiveness.
They unfortunately did not clear up the mystery of whether our memory that Marc Morano told Bill Nye that he uses Ambien to sleep at night is accurate, but the fact that even our petty sniping is enough to warrant an email blast to subscribers shows how little evidence they actually do have that they're making a real impact. People ridiculing you does not necessarily mean they're threatened by you. Sometimes it just means you're ridiculous.
Because this is, admittedly, not exactly a big news outlet with the largest readership in the world, and we're happy about that! This space is for people who have to deal with deniers, the general public shouldn't have to know about professional goobers!
Similarly, if some equally small-time, dedicated opposition outlet like theDaily Caller were to run something on anti-climate disinfo efforts, that wouldn't be worth writing home about either.
But if the paper that does have one of the largest subscriber lists, the Wall Street Journal, took the time to complain about something its opposition is doing, thatmight be something worth celebrating!
And what do you know, Thursday's print edition of the Wall Street Journal, going to some 2 million subscribers, featured an editorial complaining about "the climate-change censorship campaign."
Yes, one of the biggest papers in the country decided that a letter from green groups asking Big Tech companies to include climate disinformation when complying with the EU's Digital Services Act was worth its column inches and readers' attention.
Given that Bloomberg, Common Defense and The Hill were the only other coverage, landing news of the letter on the WSJ's pages was quite a score, if even in the shape of it calling on Elon Musk to use Twitter to "shut down the climate censors."
Sounds like the WSJ's the one that wants to censor its opponents!
ref paywall
climatewire
Minn. AG wins climate skirmish weeks before election
Minnesota's Supreme Court sides with Attorney General Keith Ellison and says some office material is protected by attorney-client privilege and does not have to be disclosed to critics of his climate lawsuit against the oil and gas industry.
BY: LESLEY CLARK
| 10/06/2022
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison answering questions during a 2020 news conference in St. Paul, Minn.
CLIMATEWIRE | Minnesota’s highest court has delivered a victory to Attorney General Keith Ellison in legal action surrounding the state’s climate liability lawsuit against the oil and gas industry in what has become a campaign issue in the Democrat’s run for reelection.
The Minnesota Supreme Court in a decision last week sided with Ellison over whether internal office deliberations about Minnesota’s climate lawsuit can be kept confidential.
The case stems from a 2019 lawsuit filed by conservative critics of Ellison and other Democratic state attorneys general who have hired outside lawyers to work on lawsuits seeking damages from oil and gas companies for climate change-related damages (Climatewire, Aug. 19, 2019).
Energy Policy Advocates, based out of Washington state, had sought documents detailing the communication between Ellison’s office and a law firm that works on climate litigation against energy companies. The group had also asked for records related to Ellison's hiring of a lawyer through a Michael Bloomberg-backed fellowship program.
...
https://dailycaller.com/2020/07/08/keith-ellison-minnesota-bloomberg-climate-lawsuit/
no lnx many
ENERGY
AG Keith Ellison Faces Lawsuit Accusing Him Of Coordinating With Bloomberg On Anti-Exxon Crusade
[pixRep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), a candidate for Democratic National Committee Chairman, speaks during a Democratic National Committee forum in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., February 11, 2017. ]
Daily Caller News Foundation
CHRIS WHITE
TECH REPORTER
July 08, 2020
A Virginia-based law firm is suing Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison for access to records revealing his use of attorneys financed by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to engage in a climate crusade targeting oil companies.
:{
}:
The nonprofit Government Accountability & Oversight (GAO) filed a lawsuit Wednesday for records detailing how the Democratic attorney general is allegedly deploying Bloomberg-financed lawyers to advance a lawsuit his office leveled against the fossil fuel industry. The firm’s complaint was filed on behalf of the nonprofit group Energy Policy Advocates.
This is the second lawsuit that GAO, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit launched in 2018, has filed against Ellison in the last two years. (RELATED: Emails Reveal Role Michael Bloomberg’s Climate Crusaders Are Playing In Maryland’s AG Office)
The law firm’s complaint also reveals that the Minnesota attorney general entered into confidentiality agreements and so-called common interest agreements requiring his office to obtain the consent of the private attorneys before releasing public information about such climate lawsuits.
[pix NEW YORK, NEW YORK - MARCH 04: Former Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg addresses his staff and the media after announcing that he will be ending his campaign on March 04, 2020 in New York City. Bloomberg, who has endorsed Joe Biden, spent millions of dollars in his short lived campaign for president.]
GAO attorney Chris Horner believes such contracts undermine open records laws and violate obligations of attorneys general to taxpayers.
“They likely are void as against public policy including that underlining open records laws, and probably violate obligations of state attorney generals to the people of their states by purporting to contract away the public’s right to access to public information such as is embodied in the MGDPA,” Horner staid in a statement Wednesday.
The agreements cover records related to lawsuits two Special Assistant Attorneys General (SAAGs) inside Ellison’s office leveled against ExxonMobil. Ellison announced lawsuits targeting Exxon, Koch Industries, and the American Petroleum Institute over what he calls “a campaign of deception” on climate change.
SAAGs are placed in attorney general offices around the country by New York University’s State Energy and Environmental Impact Center (SEEIC), which received $6 million from Bloomberg Philanthropies in 2018.
The NYU School of Law launched the group in 2017 to “identify and hire NYU Law Fellows who serve as special assistant attorneys general in state attorney general offices, focusing on clean energy, climate and environmental matters,” according to the NYU Law website.
Ellison submitted an application for SAAGs in March 2019, according to the GAO lawsuit.
He expressed in the application a willingness to do more in certain areas of “known public interest to Bloomberg and his SEEIC,” the complaint stated. Ellison’s application also suggested the attorney general intends on focusing on “multistate initiatives…including…supporting state-led efforts to investigate Exxon Mobil [sic].”
Neither Bloomberg nor Ellison’s office have responded to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s requestS for comment about the lawsuit.
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
Tags : energy keith ellison michael bloomberg minnesota
ref https://dailycaller.com/2019/09/09/michael-bloomberg-global-warming/
no lnx many
emails Reveal Role Michael Bloomberg’s Climate Crusaders Are Playing In Maryland’s AG Office
Former New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg speaks during the Presidential Gun Sense Forum in Des Moines]
Daily Caller News Foundation l
CHRIS WHITE
TECH REPORTER
September 09, 2019
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s legal fellows are likely too closely connected to the billionaire’s climate change crusading group, new emails show.
Analyst Chris Horner tells the Daily Caller News Foundation that the emails reveal how Maryland is “outsourcing” law enforcement activities to “activist donors.”
The emails apparently contradict what the Bloomberg-financed climate group has said in the past about the legal fellows it places in state attorneys general offices.
A climate attorney inside Maryland’s attorney general’s office appears to be working at the direction of a group connected to former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, according to documents published recently by a watchdog group.
The special assistant attorney move to seek guidance contracts claims from the billionaire-financed group that such attorneys are loyal only to the states where they are placed. The so-called SAAGs are being placed in state AG offices around the country by a group that received $6 million from Bloomberg in 2018.
“I’m considering moving from my current environmental-focused position to the energy position that the Maryland AG’s Office has open, ” SAAG John Howard said in an email to David Haynes, director of the State Environmental and Energy Impact Center, which works to plant attorneys in various AG offices.
The memo was published Sept. 3 by Energy Policy Advocates (EPA), a non-profit group founded in Washington state. (RELATED: One Of The Lawyers Targeting Oil Companies Worked In Bloomberg’s Office)
“Would you have a few minutes this afternoon to call me? I want to get a better sense than I currently have about what the Center envisions for these positions,” Howard added in the email, which is dated March, 13 2019. Haynes responded: “I’d be happy to chat with you about this. Could we talk tomorrow.”
Howard has been working at Maryland’s AG office since March 2018.
Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey (C) speaks at a news conference with New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (R) and other U.S. State Attorney's General to announce a state-based effort to combat climate change in the Manhattan borough of New York City, March 29, 2016. ]
Bloomberg’s grant went to the SEEI, which is designed to escalate attacks against President Donald Trump’s regulatory rollbacks.The Daily Caller News Foundation reported in February that Illinois, Maryland, and other states involved in the program hired attorneys with ties to the billionaire.
The exchange between Howard and Haynes appears to contradict SEEIC’s past claims that such fellows receive orders exclusively from their respective attorney general. The SEEIC operates out of the New York University of Law, media reports show.
The group’s website states: “NYU pays the salaries of the law fellows, but the fellows’ sole duty of loyalty is to the attorney general in whose office he or she serves. All work performed by the fellows is entirely identified and managed by their respective AG offices.”
Analysts argue Howard knew what was expected of him before he reached out.
“This scheme represents a dangerous outsourcing of law enforcement to an activist donor — and further undermines the AGs’ and Bloomberg Center’s insistence that these are simply more bodies,” Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told the DCNF.
Horner is on the board of directors at the Government Accountability & Oversight, which played a role in releasing the emails.
Howard, Haynes, and Maryland AG Brian Frosh have not responded to the DCNF’s request for comment about the nature of the program. Media reports have also raised questions about SEEI’s role in financing state attorneys general attempts to sue oil companies for supposedly contributing to climate change.
Gavin McCabe, a lawyer connected to Bloomberg Philanthropies, for instance, signed an amicus brief in 2018 supporting New York City’s yearlong climate lawsuit against Exxon and Chevron. Bloomberg founded Bloomberg Philanthropies in 2017 to provide AG offices with attorneys to help push green energy.
McCabe is one of at least eight attorneys hired by attorneys general across the country to work on environmental litigation.
McCabe’s involvement suggests Bloomberg’s money is playing a role in the anti-Exxon campaign. He made himself a part of the lawsuit demanding energy companies compensate the city for the alleged damages from global warming. U.S. District Judge John Keenan dismissed the case in July after months of arguments.
Bloomberg’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
Tags : donald trump energy michael bloomberg
Horner, “Government for Rent,” Competitive Enterprise Institute, September 2018,
https://cei.org/sites/default/files/Christopher%20Horner%20-%20Government%20for%20Rent_0.pdf.
. See also, Horner, “Government for Rent”.
3 https://climatelitigationwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/FN-13-15-42-43-45-46-USCA-slidesand-initial-budget-with-pass-throughs-copy.pdf
. See also, Horner, “Government for Rent”.
~ Brown CA gov climate summit, subnational
"off the books" experts? refugees from Obama admin?
https://cei.org/governorsclimatescheme
apr 2015
The American Petroleum Institute has added the Herald Group’s Cornelia Horner as a senior associate for media and issue management; FromAPI,Brooke Sammon, former media and public relations manager, recently joined Firehouse Strategies as a senior vice president
this past Monday, the Virginia Tech Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) hosted Christopher Horner, a Washington, D.C. attorney and notable global warming critic. Virginia Tech’s chapter of the YAF gained notoriety last fall, when it hosted former treasury secretary Bay Buchanan with a talk about the negative effects of illegal immigration on America.
The group prides itself in using controversial and attention-grabbing headlines to draw numbers to events, such as this event's title, "Noble Lies and Cheap Virtue: The Realities of the 'Climate' Agenda." With a topic as universally agreed upon by the college community as climate change, a title declaring the phenomenon an agenda relying on lies full of “cheap virtue” was sure to pique interest.
Horner began his talk with a statement that sounded somewhat relieving to a climate change/global warming theory supporter like myself. He first stated that he believed in climate change and global warming, as the computer-generated models support it.
He proceeded to display graphs that showed that global temperature averages are, in fact, rising and other graphs that showed that human carbon emission— the leading cause of climate change, according to most — are also rising. Without denying its existence, he made the claim that climate change is not caused by human action, and there is nothing that we can do to solve this inevitable phenomenon of nature.
Horner took an odd turn when he superimposed two graphs showing rising temperatures and carbon emissions and accompanied them with the statement, “Look, there is no correlation between carbon emissions and global temperature increase.”
Looking at the graph though, it was easy to see that the two were correlated to such an extent that in most places, the lines were on top of one another. What does this mean? Horner used a graphing technique that entirely contradicts his beliefs and made a statement that is completely disproven by the graph itself.
Perhaps this is why he spent less than 15 seconds on this part of his presentation, knowing his statement contradicts his evidence. It was as if he planned the presentation thinking, “If I use big words and put up a lot of graphs, college students will believe anything I say.”
In another part of his presentation, Horner used “historical” evidence to show that temperatures have been fluctuating over the course of history, citing a medieval population boom due to growth in food production as the last "warm period." He used excerpts from research conducted by his wife to show that in Elizabethan England, witches were burned at astonishing rates — from which the conclusion was drawn that this had to have been because they were blamed for failed crops and freezing temperatures.He used the famous painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware (painted in dramatic fashion seven decades later in 1851) to show that temperatures had obviously risen again, as the ice in the river was broken and melting, rather than creating a solid sheet. How could Washington have crossed if the river was completely frozen?
These “historical” sources show that temperatures have always been fluctuating — or so Horner believes. For this reason, he claims that there is nothing we can do to have an impact on the environment and climate, and there is no reason that we should try.
Shifting to an economic standpoint, Horner cited a study conducted on the economy of Spain (a country focused heavily on creating "green jobs"), claiming that for every green job created, 2.2 regular jobs are lost. Spain’s economy has been suffering heavily for years, and a study like this shows little correlation between the creation of green jobs and the loss of, for the lack of a better term, regular jobs.
Of course, the United States’s green sector economy has grown every year since 2010 and focuses heavily on manufacturing and exports — a sector that we have fallen behind in worldwide. Green jobs also pay nearly 15 percent higher on average than other jobs, putting more money in the pockets of those who specialize in environmental fields.
Horner is the epitome of a conservative, climate change denier, in spite of his claimed belief in climate change. He refuses to cite countless scientific studies that show with the incredible spike in carbon emissions since 1900 and exponential rise in population, the Earth’s ozone layer has thinned, etching away at the very protective atmosphere that makes life possible. He uses unreliable historical sources and contradictory studies to prove his point that climate change is a phenomenon that has been occurring for the history of Earth, and in turn we should take no action.
Those in Christopher Horner’s camp are those who refuse to act now at the expense of our lavish, first-world lifestyles. What they refuse to accept is the very truth proven by countless studies: if we do not act now, our posterity will never live such lifestyles.
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The Energy & Environment Legal Institute $200,000 $200,000
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built fdn to dereg
https://theintercept.com/2020/01/12/cancer-trump-administration-epa-carcinogens-regulations/
the war on the war on cancer
no pix no lnx many no graf
Sharon Lerner
January 12 2020,
WHEN ANGELA RAMIREZ was 38, she felt a slight pain in her chest. At first she thought she had pulled a muscle, but when it didn’t go away, Ramirez went to her doctor, who diagnosed her with stage 2 breast cancer. A mother of three and a parent educator in a local public school in Lake County, Illinois, Ramirez had to undergo a double mastectomy, chemotherapy, radiation, and five follow-up surgeries.
Eight years since the diagnosis, her family is still recovering. Because of complications, Ramirez is awaiting several more reconstructive surgeries. Her daughter Ada, now 15, was recently diagnosed with PTSD, in part, Ramirez thinks, because she spent much of her childhood worrying that her mother wouldn’t survive. And her husband is working 80 hours a week to cover medical expenses and lost income. “Cancer changes your whole life,” she said recently.
Ramirez used to think of her ordeal as random bad luck — an inexplicable series of genetic mutations that just happened to derail her life. But that changed in 2018, after she learned that she both lived and worked near two facilities that were emitting a cancer-causing chemical called ethylene oxide.
Two years earlier, the Environmental Protection Agency released an assessment of ethylene oxide performed by a small division of the agency known as IRIS, which crunched numbers showing that exposure to ethylene oxide caused elevated rates of tumors in the brain, lungs, uterus, and lymph systems. The technical report from IRIS, which stands for the Integrated Risk Information System, changed the classification of ethylene oxide, an odorless gas used to make other chemicals and sterilize medical equipment, from probably carcinogenic to plainly carcinogenic to humans. Based in part on several studies showing that female workers exposed to ethylene oxide had higher breast cancer rates, the report calculated a safety threshold that was 30 times more sensitive than previous estimates. Combined with agency data about local emissions, the new threshold allowed the EPA Office of Air and Radiation to identify the census tracts where residents were at increased risk of cancer from breathing ethylene oxide.
As Ramirez could plainly see on the EPA’s interactive map, the cancer risk was elevated both where she lived and, even more extremely, at the office where she worked for several years before her diagnosis, which was less than a mile from one factory that emitted the carcinogenic gas and less than three miles from another. The news was like a missing puzzle piece. “I had always found it kind of strange that I was the only one in my family who ever had cancer,” said Ramirez, who had moved to the suburbs from Chicago in 2005 in part because she wanted to be closer to nature.
Ramirez still suffers from chronic back pain and weakness. But the realization that her cancer may have resulted from emissions from the local factories has caused a different kind of suffering. “Every time I open the windows I think about it now,” she said. “I’m so angry. My kids at 2nd and 3rd grade shouldn’t have had to wonder whether their mother was going to die.”
Angela Ramirez's neighborhood is seen in this photo. The neighborhood in Waukegan, Ill., is located in a census tract that is at high risk for cancer. Jan. 2, 2020. Pat Nabong for The Intercept.Construction at Medline's facility in Waukegan, Ill. is underway on Jan. 2, 2020. In May 2019, Medline submitted a proposal to build new equipment that would control air pollution, after they came under fire for emitting ethylene oxide, a gas linked to cancer. Pat Nabong for The Intercept.]
Left/Top: The Ramirez's neighborhood in Waukegan, Ill., is part of a census tract that is at high risk for cancer. Right/Bottom: Construction at Medline's facility in Waukegan, Ill. is underway on Jan. 2, 2020. In May 2019, Medline submitted a proposal to build new equipment that would control air pollution, after they came under fire for emitting ethylene oxide.Photos: Pat Nabong for The Intercept]
The chemical industry also reacted strongly to the reports on ethylene oxide. In September 2018, after the National Air Toxics Assessment pinpointed the areas affected by the chemical, the American Chemistry Council, or ACC, a trade group that represents U.S. chemical manufacturers, asked IRIS to change its assessment of ethylene oxide. Dow Chemical, the biggest producer of ethylene oxide in the country and the second biggest in the world, also disputed the EPA’s assessment.
Now, political appointees at the EPA are engaged in what appears to be an end-run around the agency’s own science. While IRIS, which is staffed by career scientists, hasn’t officially backed away from its 2016 report, theTrump EPA recently announced that it would not be calling for the level of pollution reductions IRIS laid out during the previous administration, leaving people around the country more vulnerable to the known carcinogen. And that’s only one of the changes made under the Trump administration that promise to weaken protections for Americans’ health, many of which were intended specifically to stave off cancers.
Virtually no sector of the EPA’s work has escaped reversals that will cause disease and death among the U.S. population. The agency scrapped the Clean Power Plan and a rule to improve fuel efficiency standards for cars, depriving the public of not just the climate benefits but also the improvements to air quality and health both would have brought. The EPA rejected its own science in deciding not to ban chlorpyrifos, a pesticide linked to autism and other neurodevelopmental problems in children. Dozens of other EPA rollbacks — including the gutting of the Clean Water Act, the undermining of guidelines on emissions of methane from landfills, the loosening of restrictions on toxic air pollution from industrial facilities, the disbanding of a panel on air pollution — will have dire health consequences, as will the dramatic reduction in the enforcement of environmental laws.
The erosion of these protections may leave Americans at greater risk of all kinds of health effects, including fertility issues, birth defects, and neurodevelopmental problems — all of which have been linked to chemical exposure. But among the most devastating of Trump’s legacies will be an increase in cancers.
Trump’s Cancer Gang
With the election of Donald Trump, a small and previously marginalized group of toxics apologists suddenly and unexpectedly took control over health and environmental regulations in the United States. Considered too fringe, too craven, and too fact-averse for mainstream politics, this closely connected group had long been dismissed for taking the idea of environmental deregulation well past the point of absurdity. Under Trump, the EPA has begun executing some of these extremists’ schemes to undercut the federal government’s ability to protect the public from life-threatening toxic chemicals.
Way back in 1996, a lawyer named Christopher Horner working for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company came up with an ambitious plan to fight back against scientific studies linking cancer to secondhand smoke. Such studies, he realized, were based on the private health data of thousands of individuals. And without that data, scientists would be unable to prove a connection between cigarette smoke and cancer. Imagine if the government required that the data used for regulations be public. If that were the case, none of the crucial private health information used by scientists would be usable. Problem solved!
Horner, who worked at the firm then called Bracewell & Giuliani, recognized that the approach had “global applicability to industry” beyond tobacco and could make it nearly impossible to regulate a wide variety of cancer-causing chemicals and pollution.Within a few years, a group funded by the Koch brothers tried to use the strategy to undermine the Clean Air Act, demanding that researchers produce their data so a pivotal study could be repeated.
That attempt to destroy air pollution protections ultimately failed, and the idea hovered on the sidelines until 2014, when a few Republican House members introduced the “Secret Science Act.” Because most members of Congress recognized the gambit as a bald attempt to subvert science — then-Sen. Barbara Boxer called it “insane,” Sen. Bernie Sanders dismissed it as “laughable” — the bill didn’t come close to becoming law that year or the next, when it was introduced again. Even in mid-2016, the only support for the idea came from the fringe.
But with the election of Donald Trump later that year, the prospects of the “secret science” scheme — and others hatched over the years to help free industry of what it saw as profit-hampering regulations — suddenly became deadly serious. Trump, who had already been dismissive of science, named Horner and others interested in undermining environmental protections to his EPA transition team and then staffed the agency with political appointees who used to work for the industries they would be regulating.In April 2018, then-EPA administrator Scott Pruitt proposed a rule based on the “secret science” plan, and Horner’s wildest dreams of dismantling environmental and health regulations were set to become reality.
[Andrew Wheeler, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), speaks to members of the media after signing the Affordable Clean Energy Rule at EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, June 19, 2019. President Donald Trump is scaling back sweeping Obama-era curbs on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants burning coal, his biggest step yet to fulfill his campaign promise to stop a "war" on the fossil fuel. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesEPA administrator Andrew Wheeler, center, speaks to members of the media at EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C., on June 19, 2019. Photo: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images]
The war on cancer was meant to help banish a disease that by 1970 had become the second-leading cause of death in the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency, created that year, was part of the government’s assault on the rising tide of cancer cases. For some contaminants, such as asbestos and chemicals used in dye-making, the link to cancer was already clear. Scientists were beginning to understand that even tiny amounts of certain chemicals could alter cells, setting off a series of mutations that grow into cancerous tumors. The hope was that the agency could counter increasing cancer rates by limiting environmental exposures.
Yet 50 years after the federal government took up arms against cancer, the disease is still the second-leading cause of death. Even though cigarette smoking, the leading cause of cancer in the 1970s, has declined sharply, the American cancer rate has actually gone up over the past 40 years. Among children, who are particularly vulnerable to environmental exposures, the cancer rate has risen dramatically, increasing nearly 50 percent since 1975.
During that time, environmental exposures have been mounting. More than 140,000 chemicals and pesticides have been introduced since 1950. Even though the vast majority have not been evaluated for safety, 5,000 of them are made in such great quantities practically everyone is exposed to them. Yet most of the government spending on cancer has remained focused on treating the disease rather than preventing cancer by limiting exposure to carcinogens, such as pesticides and other environmental contaminants.
graf:
Left/Top: Federal political contributions by members of the American Chemistry Council,including parent companies and individual employees, 2008 - 2019. Compiled for The Intercept by MapLight. Right/Bottom: Federal political lobbying expenditures by members of the American Chemistry Council, including parent companies and individual employees, 2008 - 2019. Compiled for The Intercept by MapLight.Graphics: Soohee Cho/The Intercept
Since the first major law that attempted to regulate toxic chemicals passed in 1976, chemical companies have spent billions of dollars on lobbying. The member companies of the American Chemistry Council have spent more than $1.4 billion on lobbying and $77.8 million on political contributions since 2008, according to an analysis by MapLight for this story. The ACC by itself has spent $103 million on lobbying. Though staggering, these numbers are a small fraction of the trillions generated by chemical sales over that same period.
Throughout its 50-year existence, the EPA has faced the daunting task of regulating industries that are far better resourced than the agency. But the effort to rein in powerful companies, which has been met with varying degrees of success under previous administrations, has been largely abandoned under Trump. The EPA, now headed by a former coal lobbyist and run by other former lobbyists, executives, and lawyers from polluting industries, has set about undoing health protections, some of which were specifically designed to prevent cancer.
Trump, who recently tried to take credit for a 2017 dip in cancer mortality rates and announced that he would be “curing childhood cancer very shortly,” at a rally in Cincinnati last August, presumably isn’t interested in actively causing disease and death. But his eagerness to please the polluting chemical and fossil fuel industries that support him comes at the expense of American lives.
A Mess in Texas
For ethylene oxide, the chemical that Ramirez was exposed to, the road to deregulation passes through Texas. It was there, in the summer of 2018, that regulators led by state toxicologist Michael Honeycutt began working with the producers of ethylene oxide on their own standard for the chemical.
Honeycutt, who has overseen chemical assessment for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality since 1996, is known for his extremely industry-friendly approach to chemicals. Until this administration, Honeycutt made his name fighting the EPA, challenging the limits the agency tried to place on emissions of chemicals, particularly those released by the oil and gas industry. He has argued that particulate air pollution, which causes lung cancer and other diseases, can help people live longer. And working with his longtime colleague and fellow toxicologist Michael Dourson, Honeycutt loosened state protections on dozens of chemicals — rollbacks that were encouraged and welcomed by chemical manufacturers. Now, under Trump, Honeycutt’s Texas agency has essentially become a shadow EPA and he has assumed a national role in cancer policy.
The assessment of ethylene oxide that Honeycutt oversaw and the TCEQ released last year no doubt pleased the companies that make the chemical — not least because it appears to have been written by them. In June 2018, before issuing a new safety limit for ethylene oxide, Honeycutt and members of the TCEQ’s toxicology staff met in Austin with Joanna Klapacz, a toxicologist from Dow; Bill Gulledge, a senior director at the American Chemistry Council; and three scientists from Exponent, a consulting company paid by the ACC to help fend off regulation of the chemical, among them two toxicologists named Abby Li and M. Jane Teta. Representatives of Shell, BASF, and Balchem, which together with Dow released more than 200,000 pounds of ethylene oxide over the previous six years, joined the conversation by phone, according to emails of TCEQ staff released in response to a FOIA from the Sierra Club.
Dr. Mike Honeycutt is an Air Toxicologist for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the world's second largest environmental agency. RALPH BARRERA/ AMERICAN-STATESMANTexas state toxicologist Michael Honeycutt. Photo: Ralph Barrera/Austin American-Statesman]
At the meeting, a presentation from the American Chemistry Council recommended adopting estimates of safety thresholds from a paper written by Ciriaco Valdez-Flores, a Texas-based consultant who received funding from both the ACC and the Ethylene Oxide Sterilization Association. The TCEQ had considered — and rejected — the paper in an assessment of ethylene oxide it released less than two years earlier because, it said, Valdez-Flores hadn’t captured all the cancer risk from ethylene oxide. Although an EPA summary of the 2016 IRIS report on ethylene oxide characterized its confidence in the breast cancer data as “particularly high,” and noted that the breast cancer component “is based on over 200 incident cases for which the investigators also had information on other potential breast cancer risk factors,” the Valdez-Flores paper didn’t include the breast cancer studies in its evaluation. And in a presentation to the group, Teta also argued against the inclusion of the breast cancer data.
Gulledge, who manages the ACC’s panel on ethylene oxide, emailed TCEQ toxicologist Jessica Myers after the meeting and offered to draft the assessment of the chemical for the state agency. “Thank you for hosting us this week,” Gulledge wrote. “We are working on several ‘white papers’ on the risk assessment modeling and our alternative approach that should be ready in the next month or so with the goal to have a draft risk assessment manuscript ready shortly thereafter.”
Asked about the email, Tom Flanagin, director of product communications for the American Chemistry Council, denied that the group drafted the risk assessment for the TCEQ. “Mr. Gulledge is referring to a separate, independent effort … for publication in a peer reviewed journal. TCEQ acted independently in preparing their risk assessment.” Flanagin did not explain why Gulledge would be communicating with TCEQ about a purportedly separate, independent effort. Ryan Vise, director of external relations for the TCEQ, also denied that the ACC drafted or edited the state agency’s assessment. Exponent did not respond to requests for comment.
Yet the proposed ethylene oxide standard that TCEQ released this summer included many of the elements that the ACC and its scientific consultants recommended at the Texas meeting. The state agency omitted the breast cancer studies and adopted the paper by Valdez-Flores as its key study, just as the industry scientists had recommended.
And minutes from a meeting of the Ethylene Oxide Sterilization Association held the next month also indicate that the chemical industry, led by Teta and Li, who were both at the Texas meeting, drafted the state’s assessment of the chemical. According to the minutes, first reported by the Chicago Tribune, the assessment, which would provide an alternative to the IRIS ethylene oxide value, was funded and led by the industry groups. “Jane Teta and Abby Li (Exponent) will be leading” the recasting of the assessment to the industry’s liking, the minutes explained, and “TCEQ has indicated its receptiveness to considering an alternative to the IRIS value.”
The result of this collaboration between the ethylene oxide industry and Texas was a proposed standard that was 3,500 times weaker than the IRIS threshold. The Texas number was also 50 times less protective than the standard the state had released only two years earlier. While Texas offered no scientific reason for weakening its 2017 standard, regulatory developments can help explain the oddly timed reassessment: the EPA’s recognition of ethylene oxide as a carcinogen in 2018 had led to public pressure on companies that emit the gas, which had in turn led to the industry group to ask the TCEQ to issue an alternate standard.
Just as the ACC has done, the Texas agency also attempted to justify its new number by arguing that IRIS’s calculations couldn’t be correct because the body produces some ethylene oxide on its own — an idea dismissed by scientists who are not supported by the ethylene oxide industry.
“They make a big deal of endogenous exposure and say that’s why EPA numbers can’t be meaningful,” said Jennifer Jinot, a toxicologist who worked for EPA for 26 years, 12 of which she spent working on the IRIS assessment of ethylene oxide. Jinot described the TCEQ’s focus on purportedly natural levels of the chemical as “disingenuous” and said it was just one of several tricks the state agency used to make the chemical appear safer than it actually is.
“Texas has done something completely unreasonable,” said Jinot. “They’re just low-balling the whole thing.”
In an emailed response to questions, Dow spokesperson Ashley Mendoza acknowledged that Joanna Klapacz attended the 2018 meeting at TCEQ, but noted that “she was not part of the technical presentation.” The email also said that “Dow has continued to improve our [ethylene oxide] emission reduction as part of our own sustainability goals. As science advances, our ongoing collaboration with other manufacturers and multiple agencies continues to ensure maximum human safety while delivering products consumers want and need.”
The TCEQ responded to questions for this piece with an email saying that its assessment of ethylene oxide was “on the side of the best available science.” The email also said that the more protective ethylene oxide standard, which the state agency issued in March 2017, was never intended to be permanent, but instead was “to be used until a thorough multi-year systematic review and dose-response assessment could be conducted under the extensive TCEQ toxicity factor guidelines.”
The proposed safety level could have a dramatic effect on people in Texas, where at least 27 facilities emit more than 48 tons of ethylene oxide every year. At one of these facilities, a Huntsman Petrochemical Plant in Conroe Texas, the EPA estimated the cancer risk due to the release of ethylene oxide and other chemicals to be 3,000 in a million, according to a risk assessment report the agency released in December. Nationwide, the average risk of cancer from air pollution is 32 in a million.
The Texas standard could also weaken protections for people far beyond Texas, since states often consider one another’s regulations when issuing their own. “It could mess with the legal landscape globally,” said Tracey Woodruff, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of California, San Francisco school of medicine who studies how chemical exposures affect health. “Even if other states don’t adopt Texas’ levels, they tend to average them.”
Scenes from Freeport, Texas on Wednesday, December 18th, 2019. Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Dow Chemical’s plant can be seen just beyond homes in Freeport, Texas, on Dec. 18, 2019. Photo: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
While Honeycutt was once one of EPA’s main opponents, the Trump administration is now relying on his agency’s industry-biased assessment of ethylene oxide to guide the federal government’s approach to the carcinogen.IRIS spent years calculating its safety threshold for ethylene oxide and noted in its 2016 report that scientists have been studying the chemical’s “DNA-damaging properties” since the 1940s. Yet in early November, the EPA indicated it would not be calling for the reduction of emissions as much as the IRIS report would suggest is necessary. Instead, the EPA’s proposed rule, which it is required to finalize by March, calculated risk levels that were six to nine times weaker than those issued in 2016. An explanatory document released by EPA cited the Texas estimate as well as the request for correction from the American Chemistry Council and attributed its decision to change its safety level to “uncertainties” in the science.
The people who will be affected by the weakening of ethylene oxide protections are disproportionately poor and nonwhite, as the EPA’s own analysis shows. While the U.S. population overall is 12 percent African American, the areas with elevated cancer risks due to ethylene oxide are 21 percent African American, according to the document the agency released in November. Latinos are also at greater risk of exposure, making up 18 percent of the U.S. population and 31 percent of those living in areas with elevated cancer risk due to the chemical.
Those demographics aren’t unusual. While black and Latino people produce less pollution, people of color have a higher burden of pollution and are more likely to live near industrial facilities. Penny Dryden, who grew up near several polluting plants in the Rosegate section of Wilmington, Delaware, was for years unaware of the disparity. Dryden, 62, has had cancer three times. The first, breast cancer, was diagnosed when she was just 19. But this seemed to be a fact of life in her mostly African American neighborhood. Many of her friends and relatives as well as both of her parents had cancer.
In 2018, a facility near Dryden’s home that makes chemicals used in antifreeze and some processed foods released so much ethylene oxide into the air that the nearby Delaware Bridge had to be temporarily shut down. That was a temporary inconvenience to commuters, but for people who live within a three-mile radius of the plant — 52 percent of whom are people of color, and 31 percent of whom are below the poverty level — the chemical poses an ongoing health threat.
Although the cancers have taken a toll, Dryden still considers herself lucky. “Lots of people here have died of it, whole families, so many of my friends,” said Dryden, who has come to recognize and fight against the extra burden of both pollution and disease that are clustered in several communities of color in Delaware. And while she has no experience living in a pollution-free area, she feels certain the people making decisions that affect pollution levels around the country have no idea how it feels to live with polluted air. “The people in D.C. don’t go into communities like ours,” said Dryden. “They probably have never heard of Rosegate.”
For people like Dryden and Ramirez, who live near the facilities around the country — more than 100 — that emit the carcinogenic gas, the weakening of the ethylene oxide standard will result in even greater risks of cancer. “By undermining the way risk assessments are done, Texas has allowed these plants to put out more pollution because it’ll look like it’s safe when it’s not,” said Woodruff, the reproductive health professor. “They’re resetting the bar to allow more pollution going out into the world.”
Children will also disproportionately bear the burden of this additional pollution. As the EPA has pointed out, children may also be especially vulnerable to the mutagenic effects of ethylene oxide — as they are for other carcinogens. Simon Strong came to recognize kids’ particular vulnerability after his son, Oliver, died suddenly in June 2015. An exuberant 12-year-old who played saxophone and tended goal for his soccer team, Oliver was diagnosed with leukemia a week after he complained of his first symptom: a headache. He died just 36 hours later, leaving his parents bereft and filled with questions.
Oliver-1578521871Oliver Strong. Photo: Courtesy of Simon Strong]
“We were there with his oncologist in floods of tears, and I said, ‘What caused this?’ and she just burst out, ‘It’s the environment,’” Strong remembered recently. He had no idea what she meant and had never thought much about cancer before Oliver’s illness. But after his son’s death, Strong, a reporter turned investigator, began researching the causes of pediatric cancer. He read with dismay about the alarming numbers of soccer players, particularly goalies, who have developed cancer; about the connection between cancer and Roundup, a weed killer he had used liberally in the family’s backyard in Florida; and about several pediatric cancer clusters in his home state.
The problem, as he learned, was also worsening. While pediatric cancer rates were increasing overall, there had been a particularly large jump in the number of cases in infants and children under 5. Yet the government seemed to be doing little to understand what was causing these cancers or to prevent them.
So Strong launched a project along with the Baylor College of Medicine to collect information about the environmental exposures of children with cancer from their families. It’s work he wishes the federal government was doing. But as Strong’s urgency about the problem was growing, the Trump administration was going in the opposite direction, unraveling the little work that was being done on the issue.
Indeed, in May, the EPA decided to pull its funding for a network of centers that had researched the effects of various substances, including chemicals, on children. One of those research hubs, the Center for Integrative Research on Childhood Leukemia and the Environment at Berkeley, had found that exposure to pesticides, traffic emissions, tobacco smoke, and solvents are associated with childhood leukemia, the most common children’s cancer. Staff there were continuing to research the environmental causes of the disease and to educate parents and physicians, according to the physician and epidemiologist who directs the center, Catherine Metayer. “There is still so much work to do,” said Metayer. But the center lost the $1.5 million per year it had been receiving from the EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Barring intervention from Congress, the last of its federal money will be spent by this summer. “After that, our work will have to stop,” she said.
Known Killers
The closure of the pediatric environmental health centers is only one of many backward steps we’ve taken in our decades-long battle against cancer and cancer-causing exposures. The first major one came after the EPA attempted to use the Toxic Substances Control Act to ban asbestos in 1989. The ban was exactly what the EPA and the chemicals law were created to do: protect Americans from a substance that had been known for decades to cause cancer. But after the agency began the process, asbestos mining and manufacturing companies sued. A court struck down most of the government’s ban in 1991 and, since then, the agency has been wary of taking on regulatory battles it might not win. As a result, the EPA has not regulated a single chemical under the law in the almost 30 years after the 1991 ruling.
So, while 67 countries have already banned asbestos, we’re still importing it. And last year, the Trump EPA decided — against the advice of its own scientists — to continue to allow its use.
In a statement, an EPA spokesperson wrote that the agency “along with our state partners, is covering ALL bases under our legal authority to protect people’s health from asbestos exposure.” The spokesperson went on to explain an April 2019 rule that allows the agency to restrict or prohibit the use of products containing asbestos. But she declined to say why the EPA had chosen not to ban the substance altogether, as its own scientists and attorneys had recommended.
While the continued use of asbestos has deadly consequences, causing an estimated 39,000 deaths in the U.S. each year, it is just one of the chemicals the Trump administration is now in a position to greenlight. In 2016, Congress tried to improve our abysmal record on chemicals by fixing the broken Toxic Substances Control Act. The update of the law aimed to bring about greater protections by requiring the EPA to identify and restrict the most dangerous substances.But under Trump, the opposite is happening— and the opportunity to fix chemical regulation, 40 years in the making, has instead turned into another massive step backward. The assessment process, begun in the Obama era, is being carried out by an administration that is friendlier to the chemical industry than any other administration in history.
“There is no daylight between this EPA and what the big chemical companies want,” said Daniel Rosenberg, director of the federal toxics program for the Natural Resources Defense Council, or NRDC. “Whatever the term is for government by corporation, that’s what we’ve been living under for three years.” Lots of small decisions are involved in implementing the new law, including the choice of which chemicals to assess, what sources of information about them to use, and how to quantify the risks they pose. “And these details are all essentially being worked out by companies like Dow and DuPont and Chemours,” said Rosenberg. “It’s the worst-case scenario.”
Asbestos is now one of 10 compounds the EPA began assessing in 2016 under the new law. In August, the EPA announced that it was considering assessing an additional 20 chemicals and added another five in September. How these chemicals are assessed will affect Americans’ exposure levels and ultimately their risks for a range of health outcomes.
Scenes from Freeport, Texas on Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Dow Chemical’s Freeport plant is the largest chemical production facility in the western hemisphere. Photo: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
Having the Trump administration at the helm during a once-in-a-generation reassessment of toxic pollutants is especially disastrous for the effort to protect Americans from cancer. Of the 35 chemicals the EPA is now scrutinizing under the updated TSCA, 19 are widely considered by researchers to be carcinogenic. While only a tiny exposure can set off disease, more than 135 million pounds of these carcinogens were released in this country between 2014 and 2018, according to the most recent data from the EPA. And how dangerous they are found to be may ultimately impact federal and state limits on their use.
Obama administration officials were scrupulous when they began the assessment process back in 2016. “They clearly said we have to look at all the ways people are exposed because if we ignore even a single pathway, that can result in the difference between acceptable and unacceptable risk,” said Eve Gartner, an attorney who directs the toxics program at Earthjustice. But when Trump appointees came in to replace them at the EPA, that changed. Nancy Beck, who had been trying to convince the EPA to narrow the range of exposures it considered in chemical assessments when she was director of regulatory policy for the American Chemistry Council, joined the EPA in April 2017 and remade the rule exactly as industry wanted it.
Just as the environmental advocates feared, the first of the assessments under Beck’s rule, which were released over the past several months and will likely be finalized within the coming year, have minimized the risks posed by chemicals. “We’re seeing massive exclusions of known pathways for exposure,” said Gartner. “EPA is finding that chemicals that are universally understood to present massive risk are fine.”
Environmental groups, including Earthjustice, NRDC, and the Environmental Defense Fund, sued the EPA, arguing that the agency was wrong to rule out certain pathways of chemical exposures. In November, a federal appeals court agreed with them. If the ruling stands, EPA will be forced to consider exposures to chemicals through uses that have been phased out, which will affect the assessment of asbestos, for example, andPFOA, an industrial contaminant found in drinking water, even though the chemical is no longer used in the U.S.
Excluding consideration of certain exposures is just one of the ways industry insiders at the EPA appear to be underestimating the harms of toxic substances. “The specifics vary from one chemical to another, but by ignoring certain evidence, EPA uses the risk assessment process to put its thumb on the scales and come out with a result that is weaker and less health protective than it would otherwise be,” said Richard Denison, lead senior scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund. “Each time we see one of these assessments, there are ways in which the science has been played with.”
Denison pointed to the EPA’s recent handling of a likely carcinogen called 1,4-dioxane, which is used to make other chemicals and forms spontaneously in some shampoos, cosmetics, and cleaning products. In 2013, IRIS set a safety threshold for the chemical based, in part, on studies showing that female mice exposed to it developed cancerous tumors in their livers. Yet when the EPA released its draft risk assessment of 1,4-dioxane under the new TSCA law in June, “they conveniently omitted those tumors,” said Denison. “They removed the most sensitive endpoint and as a result came up with five-fold less protective risk value.”
Another dishonest technique the EPA has used to deem chemicals safe is to change safety thresholds when chemicals don’t meet them. Although the 1963 Clean Air Act mandated that the lifetime cancer risk to an average individual should be no greater than 1 in a million, since 2008 the agency has used a much less protective risk standard for carcinogens in the air: 1 in 10,000. NRDC sued in an effort to get the EPA under George W. Bush to stick with the more protective number, but a three-judge panel that included Brett Kavanaugh ruled against the environmental group in 2008. “They gutted the law and set the course for the next two decades,” said John Walke, the NRDC attorney who argued the case. When testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2018, Kavanaugh lied about the case, describing it as one in which he’d ruled for environmentalists.
Although previous administrations have used the 1-in-a-million standard when evaluating the safety of toxic chemicals, the Trump administration recently began using the 1-in-10,000 standard, Denison said. In several recent reports issued under the updated chemicals law, including a draft assessment of the deadly paint stripper methylene chloride, the EPA inexplicably used this lower bar for determining when a cancer rate for workers is unacceptable. “It looks to me like some scientists were doing the number-crunching, and somebody came up and said, ‘Yikes, look at all this risk. How do we make it go away?’” said Denison.
The EPA insists that it “is following the legal process in TSCA, which ensures that our risk evaluations are transparent and include a robust review of the available science,” according to an emailed statement from an EPA spokesperson. The statement also said, “The draft risk evaluations released so far represent the agency’s preliminary conclusions on these chemicals. EPA goes beyond what TSCA requires by peer reviewing the risk evaluations it releases in order to increase public transparency in the risk evaluation process and receive expert feedback on the science that underlies the risk determinations. If EPA’s final risk evaluations find there are unreasonable risks associated with these chemicals, the agency will propose actions to address those risks within the timeframe required by TSCA.”
Scenes from Freeport, Texas on Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Dow’s Freeport facility released more than 200 air pollutants in 2017 and has violated its permits in every quarter of the past three years, making it a high-priority violator of the Clean Air Act. Photo: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
A Polluter’s Paradise
There may be no better place to see the consequences of the unraveling of chemical regulation than in Texas.Home to roughly two-thirds of the nation’s petrochemical industry and a fast-growing number of factories that make plastic and its feedstocks, Texas is a hub for the production of carcinogenic compounds as well as a leader in the movement to weaken regulations of them. For years, Texas has been a polluter’s paradise. As the oil, gas, and petrochemical industries have exploded throughout the state, the TCEQ’s Honeycutt has presided over an easing of restrictions on their emissions even as his staff has been reduced.
With 1.7 million new cases estimated for 2019 in the United States, cancer is a particular problem in Freeport, Texas.Rates of Hodgkin lymphoma are elevated in this small town on the Gulf Coast, as are cancers of the liver and bile duct, lung, stomach, and nasal cavity and middle ear, according to a report that the Texas Department of State Health Services quietly released in 2018.
The report makes no mention of pollution as a possible cause of the elevated number of cancer cases, yet Freeport is home to the largest chemical production facility in the western hemisphere: 12,800 acres of holding tanks, machinery, canals, deep-water ports, and pipelines, owned by Dow. Alongside it are chemical production facilities owned by other companies, including BASF, Shintech, Huntsman, and the Olin Corporation, the largest chlor-alkali producer in the world, which bought part of its Freeport manufacturing site from Dow in 2015.
Dow’s Freeport plant produces more than 40 billion pounds of chemicals and other products, including the components of much of the world’s plastics. In the process, the plant emits hundreds of toxic chemicals. The facility released more than 200 air pollutants in 2017 and has violated its permits in every quarter of the past three years, making it a high-priority violator of the Clean Air Act. Between 2015 and 2018, the complex emitted more than 3 million pounds of unpermitted air pollution on top of what it was allowed to release, according to a report by the Environmental Integrity Project.
Cancer-2-08-1578686568On-site manufacturing releases of 18 of the 19 carcinogens currently being reviewed by the EPA under the revised 2016 Toxic Substances Control Act. All data drawn from the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory, 2014 – 2018, as reported by manufacturers. Locations include facilities within 50 miles. Data does not include releases at waste disposal/recycling facilities or on-site underground injection wells. Graphic: Soohee Cho/The Intercept]
Among the pollutants being released by Dow in Freeport are 11 carcinogens that are now being assessed or considered for assessment by the EPA under the new toxic chemicals law, according to EPA data. Of those chemicals, five have been shown to increase levels of the very cancers that are elevated in Freeport. Over the past five years, the Dow plant released more than 221,000 pounds of these five chemicals, including 1,2-dichloropropane, which causes bile duct cancer and is a probable cause of cancer of the nasal cavity and inner ear; 1,3-butadiene, which has been shown to increase rates of stomach cancers (and was recently released in an explosion at another chemical plant on the Texas coast); 1,1,2-trichloroethane and 1,1-dichloroethane, both of which have been linked to liver cancer in mice; and 1,2-dichloroethane, a probable carcinogen that has been linked to stomach, liver, and lung cancers.
But initial reports that the EPA recently released on the chemicals it’s investigating omit information that the agency has in its own databases about where and in what quantities these chemicals are produced, which companies make them, and how they’re used. As a result, most people in Freeport — and other polluted communities — do not realize that the industrial facilities near them are releasing dangerous amounts of these carcinogens. Also, because they omit this critical information, the assessments themselves may not reflect the true dangers posed by these substances.
Dow has done little to address the prevalence of cancer in the area, though the company did sponsor a “Sparkles and Spurs” fundraiser in 2018 to help buy a CT scanner for the CHI St. Luke’s Health cancer center in Brazosport, Texas, which is just a 15-minute drive from the Dow Chemical plant. Some residents call it the “Dow Cancer Center” because it was built on land donated by the giant chemical company. The evening of food, fun, and “foot stompin’” country music helped the center purchase the CT scanner, which the hospital is still using to diagnose new cancer cases.
Although they are more likely to get certain cancers, residents of Freeport — where the median household income is less than $37,000 a year — may have a difficult time getting care at the local hospital. “The Dow cancer center won’t take indigent patients,” said Melanie Oldham, a Freeport resident and physical therapist who said that she has worked with hundreds of clients in the area who have had cancer. “People who don’t have good insurance end up having to drive back and forth to either Galveston or to MD Anderson, which is an hour away.” Many of them are workers at the Dow plant, according to Oldham. “These are great jobs until you’re 50 or so,” she said. “That’s when a lot of my patients develop cancer.”
Physical therapist, Melanie Oldham, in her Freeport, Texas home, Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Physical therapist Melanie Oldham at her home in Freeport, Texas, on Dec. 18, 2019. Photo: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
Oldham pushed for years to get the state to conduct the cancer incidence study it released in 2018. The results confirmed her hunch that cancer rates in Freeport continued to exceed state and national rates. But the vindication brought no relief. “Dow could prevent a lot of these cancers,” said Oldham, “but instead it’s ‘Let’s put money into the local cancer center.’ It’s all about PR for them.”
The CHI St. Luke’s Health-Brazosport Hospital emailed a statement in response to inquiries from The Intercept saying, “CHI St. Luke’s Health is committed to serving all in our community including the poor and vulnerable. We have a consistent stewardship policy across our division that outlines our process for caring for underserved and vulnerable patients who can’t afford healthcare services.”
The Texas Department of State Health Services said it has not investigated the environmental causes of the increased number of cancer cases in Freeport. “Our protocol is to continue to monitor the situation and re-evaluate as more data becomes available,” department spokesperson Chris Van Deusen wrote in an email to The Intercept. In a separate email, Van Deusen wrote that the health department could not provide any earlier reports on cancer rates in Freeport because it doesn’t retain them after four years.
For Clarence Thompson, cancer came as no surprise. Many of the people he worked with at the Dow plant in Freeport have already died of the disease. Thompson, who was employed by a company that contracted with Dow, did pipe-fitting, welding, and machine operation at the Texas plant for more than 25 years and worked there when a cluster of brain cancer cases was identified among workers. Back then Thompson was in near constant motion, according to Eve Thompson, his wife of 43 years. “Even when he’d come in from work, he’d keep working, mow the yard, or tinker with something,” she recently recalled. “I did not marry a lazy man.”
Clarence Thompson stands outside of his Brazoria, Texas home assisted by a walking stick, on Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Clarence Thompson stands outside of his home in Brazoria, Texas, assisted by a walking stick, on Dec. 18, 2019. Photo: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
The front yard of Clarence Thompson’s home in Brazoria, Texas, Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.Willie Leona Willow applies lotion to her father, Clarence Thompson’s face prior to going outside, at Clarence’s home in Brazoria, Texas, Wednesday, December 18th, 2019.Todd Spoth for The Intercept.
Left/Top: The front yard of the Thompson’s home in Brazoria. Right/Bottom: Thompson's daughter, Willie Leona Willow, applies lotion to her father's face prior to going outside.Photos: Todd Spoth for The Intercept]
At 68, Thompson still wants to work, but these days he can barely walk. He has trouble remembering things and difficulty eating, and suffers from near constant pain in his lower back. At first Thompson thought his symptoms were just part of growing older. But Eve suspected that something was wrong. And when she took him to a doctor in June, he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer of the white blood cells. In the months since, Thompson, who is almost 6 feet tall, has lost 50 pounds and has been hospitalized with several life-threatening infections. Thompson said he was exposed to several carcinogens while working at the Dow plant, including ethylene oxide and asbestos, both of which have been linked to multiple myeloma.
Yet even as his vitality is draining away, Thompson worries about the dangers that chemicals from the plant may pose both to other workers and neighbors.
Residents of Freeport are not the only people living dangerously near facilities that emit the carcinogenic chemicals now under scrutiny from the EPA. An analysis performed for this story by Material Research, an environmental data analysis company, shows that the chemicals are being released in particularly large quantities in eight hubs for the production and disposal of plastic. Among the most polluted hotspots are industrial areas in Lake Charles and Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Port Arthur and Houston, Texas; El Dorado, Arkansas; and Louisville and Calvert City, Kentucky.
Many people living in these highly polluted communities don’t know what chemicals they’re breathing, let alone the dangers they present, according to Wilma Subra, an environmental consultant who has worked in all of these hotspots. “But when you go there and say these are the chemicals and these are their known human health impacts, people start saying Oh, I have that, I have that, and I have that,” said Subra. “Most of those facilities have been there two or three generations and people are able to tell you not just what cancers they have but what cancers their parents and aunts and uncles had.”
More Leukemia, Please
While some carcinogenic chemicals that have already gone through the IRIS process are getting a more forgiving assessment through TSCA, the EPA is also refusing to release one IRIS report — on formaldehyde — even as it performs a new assessment of the chemical. Formaldehyde, used in building materials, glue insulation, and fabric, has been widely recognized as a cause of leukemia. In 2018, IRIS’s assessment of the chemical, which was expected to confirm the link to the blood cancer, was ready for “imminent release,” as then-EPA administrator Scott Pruitt told the Senate.
Formaldehyde already accounts for more than half the nationwide cancer risk from air pollution. Because it’s so widespread — more than 93 million pounds have been released in the U.S. since 2014 — and because its safety threshold is now 30 years old and evidence of its carcinogenicity has mounted during that time, updating the number IRIS calculated would likely increase the official cancer risk in many places around the country and drive up the number of census tracts where the cancer rate is officially problematic. But in April, EPA administrator Andrew Wheeler announced that the agency would not be releasing the IRIS report on the chemical, which had been in the works for more than a decade.
The IRIS assessment was one of 11 the agency withheld from publication, according to a March report from the Government Accountability Office. (In its statement, the EPA described these reports as “reduced from the IRIS workflow.”) Wheeler said that the EPA would instead assess formaldehyde through the new toxic chemicals law, thus indefinitely delaying the bad news about formaldehyde and cancer.
It’s worth noting that the Trump appointee who now heads the EPA’s Office of Research Development where IRIS assessments are produced, David Dunlap, used to work for Koch Industries. Georgia-Pacific Chemicals, a subsidiary of Koch, is one of the country’s largest producers of formaldehyde. Before working for Koch, Dunlap handled regulation for the Chlorine Institute, a trade group to which Dow and Olin belong. Dunlap also served on the ACC’s formaldehyde panel, which has disputed the link between the chemical and leukemia. Nancy Beck, the political appointee at the EPA who rewrote the rule determining how the agency would assess chemicals, also worked for the ACC. And David Fischer, the person who replaced her at the agency after she left this summer, is an ACC alum as well, having spent a decade working there on the TSCA.
Honeycutt, who gave the keynote address at the ACC’s “premier” regulatory conference in 2018, also has strong ties to the trade group. Even though he remains in Texas, Honeycutt has had an outsized impact on chemical policy beyond the state and is in close touch with EPA staff. Before the TCEQ publicly released its ethylene oxide assessment, Honeycuttsent it to Anne Idsal, a former TCEQ employee who is now running the EPA’s Air Office, which is steering the agency’s policy on ethylene oxide. A Texan with close ties to the oil and gas industry, Idsal’s father owned the ranch where Dick Cheney shot a Texas attorney while hunting quail.
Honeycutt also emailed an explanation of the assessment to Erin Chancellor, another former TCEQ employee who now heads the EPA’s regional office in Texas, telling her to “hold it close.” Texas’s top toxicologist may have written about ethylene oxide to other EPA staff and industry representatives, but the Texas agency has refused to provide some documents in response to a Sierra Club public records request specifically asking for communications between TCEQ staff and a long list of interested parties, including the American Petroleum Institute, the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, Chevron Phillips, Exxon Mobil, Formosa, Georgia-Pacific, and Dow/DuPont. In September, after the Sierra Club pushed to get the documents the TCEQ had withheld, the attorney general of Texas ruled in its favor. In response, the TCEQ took the unusual step of suing the attorney general rather than complying with the decision. That case is now pending.
Asked about Honeycutt’s emails to Idsal and Chancellor, the TCEQ’s spokesperson wrote in an email that “TCEQ routinely interacts and share information with EPA.” His email also said that the state attorney general didn’t rule on whether certain documents “fall within exceptions to disclosure under the Texas Public Information Act” and that the only way to get him to address the question was to sue.
Meanwhile, Honeycutt is also making changes that will affect how all cancer-causing chemicals are treated throughout the country. In 2017, then-EPA administrator Scott Pruitt named Honeycutt chair of the agency’s influential Science Advisory Board. The group is supposed to provide scientific advice to the administrator, but under Trump it has been stacked with industry apologists. This summer, Honeycutt, along with fellow advisory board members from Dow Chemical, Exxon Mobil, and the American Chemistry Council, quietly began proposing profound and lasting changes to the EPA’s cancer guidelines.
Throughout the EPA’s almost 50-year history, the agency has held that there is no safe level of a carcinogen. But Honeycutt and his colleagues on the advisory board have proposed reversing that assumption. “They want to flip it so there can be safe levels of cancer-causing chemicals,” said Jen Sass, a senior scientist at NRDC, who sees the move as a ruse for allowing companies to freely release pollutants. “Their presumption is that low levels of carcinogens aren’t harmful and might even be good for you. And industry wants to define low level as whatever level you’re exposed to.”
In an emailed response to questions about the cancer guidelines, a spokesperson for the agency wrote, “The EPA is currently considering the SAB member’s individual comments as well as those provided by the public as they consider next steps for this project.”
Because the nation’s cancer guidelines are rewritten very infrequently — the most recent version was published in 2005 — Sass fears that the new ones will have an enduring impact. “Guidances like this last for decades,” she said. “I don’t know how this could be undone later.”
[A white substance resembling steam billows out of Vantage's factory in Gurnee, Ill. on Jan. 2, 2020. Vantage is one of the factories in Lake County that emits ethylene oxide, a gas known to cause cancer. Pat Nabong for The Intercept.Steam billows out of Vantage’s factory in Gurnee, Ill., on Jan. 2, 2020. Vantage is one of the factories in Lake County that emits ethylene oxide. Photo: Pat Nabong for The Intercept]
Making America Sick Again
Other hard-to-reverse plans that could result in increased cancers rates throughout the country are also quietly moving ahead. On December 31, the deregulatory dream of tobacco industry attorney Christopher Horner took another step closer to becoming national policy. While Trump was preparing to ring in the new year at Mar-a-Lago with Rudy Giuliani, Honeycutt released an analysis of the proposed secret science rule — now rebranded “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” — on behalf of the EPA’s science advisory board.The EPA now has to answer several questions the board posed in that document. Once it is finalized, the rule will have to undergo a 60-day comment period. But after that, the once pie-in-the-sky scheme is likely to become the law of the land.
If and when it does get finalized and survives the legal challenges it will certainly face, the secret science rule will be even more crippling to health-based regulations than Horner first envisioned. His original idea was to require that studies used to make regulatory decisions be reproducible — which sounds fine in theory until you understand that they are often based on confidential private health data of thousands of individuals. And an earlier version of the EPA’s proposed rule called for placing these restrictions only on certain studies. But the EPA amended the proposal last year to require that all raw data and models underlying regulatory decisions be made available for reanalysis, with exceptions possible only on the administrator’s whim.
The requirement would mean that even science that was used to guide past regulations may be up for grabs. The EPA’s 2016 ethylene oxide assessment was partially based on breast cancer incidence data that contained confidential personal information, so under the proposed secret science rule that data could be ruled illegitimate. The rule could also undercut the utility of all the data that Simon Strong is collecting in honor of his son. Because that information will be collected in accordance with standard privacy protocols, it wouldn’t be considered in regulatory decision-making.
And the EPA could be prevented from basing any regulation on studies of cancer clusters like the one near the Dow plant in Freeport, Texas. “The way you show a cluster is to go to a community and enter their confidential health information and compare that to other areas,” said Andrew Rosenberg, director of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, one of dozens of groups that oppose the proposed rule. “But you wouldn’t be able to release that raw data because it’s confidential.”
The rule could render other groundbreaking science useless for protecting public health, too, such as studies showing the link between air pollution and lung cancer, between smoking and various cancers, or between the industrial contaminant PFOA and testicular and kidney cancer. The change would mark a profound shift both for the U.S. government and for the American people. “It’s saying what’s important is no longer the public interest but the industrial interest,” said Rosenberg. “Cancer is the most obvious and feared sign of ignoring public interest. And this will lead to more cancer.”
horner 46 PP AGENDA 21 ~ UN BS?
~ Brown CA gov climate summit, subnational
"off the books" experts? refugees from Obama admin?
https://cei.org/governorsclimatescheme
Government for Rent
How Special Interests Finance Governors to Pursue Their Climate Policy Agenda
Christopher C. Horner • September 11, 2018
Executive Summary
FROM SEPTEMBER 12 TO 14, 2018, California Governor Jerry Brown (D) will host a “Global Climate Action Summit,” an official state event using public positions and taxpayer resources to make climate change an issue of greater political concern before the 2018 elections.1 This three-day event is budgeted at $10 million, provided by “strong support from individuals, foundations, governments and businesses. Supporters will be able to engage Summit leaders”—e.g., elected office holders—“and shape an event that will catalyze [government] climate action worldwide.”
Open record productions reveal that this summit is part of an enormous climate industry that funnels donor money through nonprofit organizations to staff up politicians’ offices. This is doneoff the books, and the nonprofits take a handsome percentage for serving as middlemen. The September event is just one component of a sprawling enterprise that underwrites “support functions” for politicians to advocate the parties’ aligned policy agenda...
Implementation of the Paris agenda requires domestic policies, and implementing those policies is the principal objective of the campaign detailed in this paper. The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) recently revealed a similar model in the report, “Law Enforcement for Rent,” that is used to provide off-books staff members for state attorneys general to investigate opponents of the climate agenda.6 This approach raises serious questions about transparency of and restrictions on gifts to elected officials under various state laws:7 Is this provision of outside consultants on a donor’s tab a gift? Does it violate gift limits? Are the gifts properly reported? Is this private provision of government services unlawful in that jurisdiction? It would be at the federal level under the Antideficiency Act, which was enacted to prevent a variety of abuses, including bestowing private benefits and having officials avoid incurring obligation to private parties.8...
The objective of all this effort is to advance a narrative through supportive media coverage of campaigns such as a governors’ U.S. Climate Alliance (USCA) and events such as Governor Brown’s San Francisco Summit, which is supposedly the product of public officials’ work, if courtesy of consultants and public relations agents provided by donors and through activist groups underwritten by donors using a nonprofit as the pass-through.
Privately Funded Government
The modus operandi revealed in the documents excerpted in this report entails seeding local and statewide elected offices with privately funded in-house staff members (governors’ staffs called them “refugees” from the Obama administration).17 The objective is to house former National Security Council and State Department appointees to, as one email put it, “resume shaping the U.S. position on” the energy and climate change agenda.18
Those emails lay out the inducements of an outside network of privately funded consultants and public relations assistance for elected officials who agree to lend their offices to a donor-funded advocacy campaign for the donors’ climate agenda.
Documents suggest politicians are now using nonprofits and consultants as pass-throughs for donors to support politicians with resources that the relevant legislatures will not provide and that donors cannot legally provide directly. Emails such as Dan Carol’s pitch and others obtained under state open records laws reveal a campaign initiated immediately after the 2016 elections. The campaign assembled “some collection of former Obama staffers” teaming with nonprofit, 501(c)3 policy, and grant-making groups to put some portion of thatannual billion dollars to work directly at the disposal of elected officials.19
Those officials’ staff members took the lead in designing, proposing, obtaining off-the-books funding for the plan, and initially executing it. Their rationale was “[I]t can’t always be us staff” performing the work of government.20 Any public or legal expectations to the contrary took a back seat to their bosses’ and donors’ expectations.
The program involves not just running the money through “pass-through” charities. Given the pass-throughs’ often exorbitant fees for performing this service (up to 24 percent, depending on what function they are serving), donors also directly pay for still more consultants, including media promoters. Among the work that the PR firm promotes are reports produced for the officials by outside consultants. The donor’s cost for those can be $100,000 per report, a report plainly given to elected officeholders to tout their leadership and to advance an aligned policy agenda.
I. MODEL A—DONOR-FUNDED IN-HOUSE STAFF...
II. MODEL B—PRIVATELY FUNDED OUTSIDE “SUPPORT FUNCTIONS” Public records reveal another component of private funding of elected officials who are pursuing an activist agenda. That is the “Secretariat” function, as named in the USCA contract. Secretariats in this context are typically nonprofit groups paid by donors to run a politician’s climate-policy campaign. The Secretariat function can, e.g., afford public employees electronic “platforms” outside of public email servers. Still, turning to private sources to fund government functions does not free those...
The focus of this paper is the whiteboard’s right column, “Shared Services” (“Tap Existing NGO + Other Expertise”), discussed among staff as what the pass-throughs would provide. The relationship with their obviously close—if nonprofit—passthrough allies or preferred activist groups is particularly concerning. For example, Carol’s “USCA Initial Budget Worksheet” lists the American Lung Association among its intended plus-ups and pass-throughs (see Figure 6). Also listed are the World Resources Institute, Rocky
Mountain Institute, Georgetown Climate Center, and groups representing professional regulators, such as the Environmental Council of the States. The only specific figure provided in this version is $2.5 million for the National Association of State Energy Officials. Carol’s PowerPoint presentation, which is titled “Climate & Energy Outcomes for 2017– 2021: U.S. Climate Alliance,” cites “2018: $15 million ramps up work ($10 million passed through to consortium partners)” and “2019: $30 million as we engage new governors, share deployment learnings, and drive a new national priorities debate ($25 passed through to consortium partners).”45 In this document, the governors’ aides articulate their request for a ramp-up of their donors’ funding for outside“support functions” to $50 million per year (“2020–2021: $50 million to drive state leadership activity in a critical year and develop new federalism funding models to leverage investments in mid-term targets and carbon pricing moving forward.”). Carol’s assertion that this figure to supplement governors’ staff members is reasonable is based on his estimate of how much of the $1 billion per year of foundation “climate” money is going to “groups in the deployment business.” 46 It appears that the authors of this campaign both wrote and transmitted the proposal to donors to fund a 501(c)3 for the governors’ policy advocacy use while using public offices...
The “Secretariat”—Good “Parking” if You Can Get It
THE SECRETARIAT RUNS THESE nominal groups “created” by politicians.52 More precisely, in the view of donors and politicians’ staff members, the Secretariat provides a nonprofit to “park” the effort of adding staff and consultants for the politicians. For a healthy fee, as discussed in detail below. “Parking it” is, in fact, how the staff described the USCA. For example, “[E]rin [Rogers] of Hewlett preferred GTown and was really nervous about parking this at UNF.”53 (See Figure 7.) To get the job, groups make proposals to the politicians’ offices while offering to run the issue-advocacy campaign, to leave decisions to the elected officials, and to assign execution to the officials’ staff members,54 who were supplemented by the non-profit as “a back office/support role.”55 For example, the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) sent by Governor
...
The Secretariat’s Beauty Contest
CANDIDATE ORGANIZATIONS VYING for the up to 24 percent premium for staff hires (and 15 percent for other overhead) include private universities that are not subject to state open records laws, as well as more traditional advocacy groups. Draft contracts obtained by CEI explicitly state that the politicians will make hiring decisions that will be formally executed by the nonprofit— which will then hire and house the “support functions” that are to be at the politicians’ disposal and direction. This arrangement was made possible by the “plethora of advocate and funder interest.”59 (See Figure 8
...
DONOR-FUNDED OUTSIDE CONSULTANTS FOR GOVERNORS
Staffing Up the Summit
THE ADDITIONAL FULL-TIME STAFF members that UNF also hired for Brown to help pull off his September Global Climate Summit were to “be employed by the United Nations Foundation and seconded to the office of the Governor of California.”92 A November 27, 2017, email on one of the listservs used by public employees to coordinate with other activists (these are both Google Groups and private services financed by donors) and from which several emails were obtained by CEI under open records laws shows that UNF advertised for at least four senior staff members to run it.93 This email announcing the openings stated that they were for “The Global Climate Action Summit, which is being hosted by California [Governor] Jerry Brown in September in San Regarding the outside consultants for whom the Secretariat exists, in part, to hire, consider another high-profile announcement by Govs. Brown, Cuomo, and Inslee, who were on a junket to New York City for another media event about climate advocacy, “Climate Week.” Climate Week is a week in mid-September every year of dining with donors, underwritten by donors, discussing the pursuit of aligned interests with donors. (It is a project of The Climate Group, Secretariat for Brown’s Under2 Coalition, which also is being run, at least in part, out of his office and by a state employee). Emails show several governors and Tom Steyer were scheduled to attend a politicians/donors dinner and at least one worked to arrange a private meeting during Climate Week 2017. (See page 37.) Then, the governors unveiled a glossy report that was branded prominently “[U.S.] Climate Alliance, 2017 Annual Report, Alliance States Take the Lead,”77 presented with an opening “Message from the Co-Chairs” and was written in the first person “we” (as in, e.g., “What We Are Doing”). It was actually written and delivered by high-priced consultants. Where do governors get money for such a venture? How would that be...
[BROWN SUMMIT BOASTS WHO'S WHO OF ..]
BLOOMBERG Philanthropies, the Bloomberg group Global Covenant of Mayors, Rockefeller Brothers Foundation (Michael Northrop), Turner’s UN Foundation, Steyer’s NextGen America and NextGen Policy, The Climate Group, Climate Network (the vehicle for former UNFCCC Chair Christiana Figures “Mission 2020”), the consultancy Converge Strategies, the business lobby BSR, and the pressure groups Ceres and World Wildlife Fund.99 (See Figure 15.) What is, in fact, a private donor–financed production will be preceded by a major public affairs blitz, which the public should view in the context of the knowledge obtained by public records requests and set forth in this paper: this is what activist government for hire looks like, and how it is brought about. ...
Money, Ego, and Influence: Too Much Donor Cash?
USCA IS JUST ONE OF MANY vehicles created in response to President Trump’s stated intention to withdraw from the Paris climate treaty. Others include Michael Bloomberg’s America’s Pledge (this “[f]under of many initiatives” is also funding the “Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy”100) and We Are Still In (WASI).101 Other largely dormant groups began making noise again, such as the Mayors National Climate ...
The America’s Pledge meeting Burgess references was called as an “expert dialogue in San Francisco on the America’s Pledge project.”119 Organized by Bloomberg Philanthropies and headquartered in New York City, America’s Pledge was strategized in the San Francisco offices of Michael Bloomberg’s business interests, Bloomberg LP.120 The emails suggest that donors paid for Inslee’s aide/WRI employee Schuler and three employees of the office of Governor Jerry Brown to attend and to advise Bloomberg’s group. Attachments to several emails show that WRI’s role included reimbursing participants for travel expenses.121 In addition to Hewlett’s Pershing and Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Daniel Firger, participants included representatives from the following:
• America’s Pledge contractor Rocky Mountain Institute, • World Wildlife Fund, • Rhodium Group, • Climate Nexus, • Sierra Club, • World Wildlife Fund, • Natural Resources Defense Council, • Environmental Defense Fund, • Steyer’s Advanced Energy Economy, and Energy Foundation (EF), and
• EF contractor Synapse.122
Also invited was former Obama EPA chief Gina McCarthy,who was unavailable. Other participants or invitees included Governor Inslee’s aide Reed Schuler, Governor Brown’s aide Aimee Barnes, California EPA’s Alexa Kleystauber, and California Air Resources Board’s Edie Chang and Rajinder Sahota. Public employees who participated seemingly traveled and appeared at this weekday strategy conference on taxpayer time. Because California exercises one of the most expansive executive privilege claims in the country, keeping whatever it considers to be governors’ office correspondence from public inspection, further details remain—at this time—unavailable. Other governors whom Team Steyer and others worked to persuade include Pennsylvania’s Governor Tom Wolf. When asked for his schedule, Governor Wolf’s staff declined to provide it under the state’s Right to Know Law: “Please note that the Governor’s schedule may be found at www.governor.pa.gov/schedule/.”123 This statement is only partly true. That meeting, as far as the publicly available schedule was concerned, was simply a “political meeting.”124 Yet, according to emails released under Pennsylvania’s Right to Know Law (RTKL), it was, in fact, “Tom Steyer meeting.”125 ...
Further “Support Functions”— Activist-Run Listserv “Safehouses”
THE JOB POSTINGS BY UNITED Nations Foundation (UNF) for positions with Governor Brown’s Summit, as obtained by CEI and discussed earlier, were circulated on the listserv kitchencab@ googlegroups.com. This group is described by one activist in an email obtained from the city of Houston as a “Kitchen Cabinet” of national and global NGOs focused on “(participants pasted below)[sic].” This group is described by one activist in an email obtained from the City of Houston as having been “convened by the Union of Concerned Scientists, OxFam International, National Resources Defense Council, and WRI to coordinate around short-and medium-term strategies in advance or [sic]/reaction to Trump administration and Congressional actions on international climate policy.”135 [Parenthetical in original.] Several such listservs appear on occasion in public record productions.136 This is ...
Conclusion
GOVERNOR JERRY BROWN’S September Summit turns up in planning documents obtained through public records requests as a milestone event for nearly every Secretariat-run activist group, whether it’s USCA, Michael Bloomberg’s “America’s Pledge,” “We Are Still In,” or others. Reasons for this include the desire—made clear in the Climate Briefing Service memo—to finally make climate a major election issue in the United States, courtesy of activist donors, if through the use of public office. The annual Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC—the climate treaty that yielded the Kyoto and Paris climate deals—is being held in Katowice, Poland, after elections in the United States. The absence of a glamour venue for a media circus promoting the climate agenda creates an acute need for an earlier event in a location attractive to U.S. media. Something had to be done. Governor Brown’s Summit is a big part of that response—thanks to the plethora of funder interest underwriting the larger politician/donor/NGO axis of which this Summit is merely a symptom.
...donors desire, on the claim that “it can’t always be us staff”? It is startling to consider that a legislature would have to even consider the need to expressly forbid an elected officeholder from complementing the resources provided by the legislature, with millions of dollars in in-house “staff” and consultant services from donors with avowed activist, policy objectives. Open record productions, as revealed in this paper, uncover enough about these two models of off-the-books governance to demand immediate legislative oversight—at the state and federal levels—to determine the propriety and legality of this use, and the means of funding the use, of public offices. Legislatures and inspectors general should promptly inquire whether the perceived gaps in the laws are real and, if so, remedy that immediately. If the supposed authority to engage in this practice is imagined, and this violates state law then that, too, calls for remedy. ENDIT]
==
919 e&e art'ls (more and more recent than schnare) split at FMLE]
horner 3&e posts:
Horner's wsj Letter Re: “Corporate Social Responsibility” (CSR) Funds
January 29th, 2018|"Climate Change", Billionaire Scammers, Horner, Media Coverage, Rockefeller's
“Social investing” campaigns include not only promotion of preferred investments but a determined effort to disable these investments’ competition. That darker flip side involves a “climate risk disclosure” industry. Players in this “CRD” movement include state attorneys general, comptrollers and treasurers, and lawmakers combining with public pension funds, interest groups and, of course, contingency-fee lawyers. [...]
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Horner: Don’t hype draft climate studies
August 14th, 2017|"Climate Change", Bad Science, Conflict of Interest, Horner, Media Coverage
by Chris Horner, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow As Appearing in USA Today Another week of the Trump presidency, another bout of fevered reporting on claims promoted by the career (and holdover) federal employee “resistance.” But particularly when it comes to climate change, it seems the ordinary way of doing things is simply too much [...]
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Horner: Obama’s Paris climate scheme revelation. Emails show ‘disturbing contempt’ for the Senate’s treaty role
July 25th, 2017|2015 Paris Talks, Conflict of Interest, Horner, Media Coverage, Paris Climate Treaty
by Chris Horner, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow As Appearing in the Washington Times The New York Times on Aug. 24, 2014, broke a major news story: “Obama pushing Climate Accord in Lieu of Treaty.” It’s a clumsy headline — no one dared claim the Kyoto Protocol was anything other than a treaty requiring Senate ratification, [...]
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Horner Briefs House of Lords on President Trump’s Decision to Withdraw from the Paris Climate Treaty
July 20th, 2017|"Climate Change", 2015 Paris Talks, Horner, Paris Climate Treaty
London, England -- On July 10, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow Chris Horner gave a talk in the UK House of Lords, hosted by Lord Lawson of Blaby and Dr. Benny Peiser of the Global Warming Policy Foundation. Attended by several members of the House and other interested parties, Horner's talk and the discussion afterward centered [...]
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Horner on Delingpole’s Podcast
July 19th, 2017|"Climate Change", 2015 Paris Talks, Conflict of Interest, Horner, Media Coverage, War on Coal
On July 19, 2017, Breitbart's James Delingpole released a podcast of an interview he conducted with E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow Chris Horner. Horner was in the United Kingdom in early July, and his trip included a briefing to the House of Lords regarding President Trump's decision to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate [...]
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Horner: Signaling political virtue via the Paris accord
July 4th, 2017|2015 Paris Talks, Conflict of Interest, Horner, Media Coverage, Paris Climate Treaty
by Chris Horner, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow As Appearing in the Washington Times The latest in political virtue signaling is the “We Are Still In” movement, a self-described group of “mayors, governors, college and university leaders, businesses, and investors” who claim they plan to comply with the Paris Climate Agreement independently of United States [...]
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Horner: Energy Week Is About America’s Energy Future Gallery
Horner: Energy Week Is About America’s Energy Future
Horner: Energy Week Is About America’s Energy Future
June 29th, 2017|Energy, Horner, Media Coverage, Trump Transition
by Chris Horner, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow As Appearing in the Daily Caller The Trump Administration has proclaimed this week as “Energy Week” – a time to focus on pro-energy initiatives that can actually boost our economy, promote a message of U.S. “energy dominance” and highlight many disastrous Obama-era energy policies that helped stall [...]
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Horner: Breaking Trump’s vow amounts to a costly betrayal
Horner: Breaking Trump’s vow amounts to a costly betrayal
Horner: Breaking Trump’s vow amounts to a costly betrayal
April 19th, 2017|2015 Paris Talks, Horner, International, Media Coverage, Paris Climate Treaty
by Chris Horner, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow As Appearing in USA Today President Trump’s advisers are debating recommendations on the Paris climate treaty. Reported arguments for staying in it appear to be no more than rationalizations to break Trump’s campaign promise to leave. Consider the line that it is not a treaty because it’s [...]
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Horner & Lewis: White House Floats Excuses to Break Trump’s Promise to Cancel Paris Climate Treaty
Horner & Lewis: White House Floats Excuses to Break Trump’s Promise to Cancel Paris Climate Treaty
Horner & Lewis: White House Floats Excuses to Break Trump’s Promise to Cancel Paris Climate Treaty
April 17th, 2017|2015 Paris Talks, Conflict of Interest, Horner, Paris Climate Treaty
by Chris Horner & Marlo Lewis, Jr. Competitive Enterprise Institute This week, White House senior advisers will meet to discuss the future of U.S. involvement in the Paris Climate Treaty. During campaign speeches, President Trump repeatedly promised the American public that if elected, he would cancel U.S. participation in the Paris Climate Agreement and stop [...]
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Horner: The Strange Case of Eric Schneiderman and the Hidden Emails Gallery
Horner: The Strange Case of Eric Schneiderman and the Hidden Emails
Horner: The Strange Case of Eric Schneiderman and the Hidden Emails
March 30th, 2017|AG Collusion, Conflict of Interest, Horner, RICO, Silencing Dissenters, Stonewalling
by Chris Horner, Senior Legal Fellow This week marks the one-year anniversary of nearly two dozen state attorneys general, alongside “green” investor and former vice president Al Gore, announcing a coalition to investigate, as fraud, opposition to the climate change political agenda. Since that blustery event, however, all signs are that ringleader New York Attorney [...]
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horner climate lawsuits (see horner AG hit report node)
https://www.desmogblog.com/2019/01/26/competitive-enterprise-institute-climate-denial-target-nbc-cities-liability-suits
mofo
sci mag 2015
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/10/climate-scientist-requesting-federal-investigation-feels-heat-house-republicans
Climate scientist requesting federal investigation feels heat from House Republicans
By Warren CornwallOct. 5, 2015 , 3:30 PM
A scientist who helped organize a call for a federal investigation of the fossil fuel industry—for allegedly orchestrating a cover-up of climate change dangers—has himself become the target of a congressional probe.
Last week, Representative Lamar Smith (R–TX), the chairman of the science panel of the House of Representatives, announced plans to investigate a nonprofit research group led by climate scientist Jagadish Shukla of George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. He is the lead signer of a letter to White House officials that urges the use of an antiracketeering law to crack down on energy firms that have funded efforts to raise doubts about climate science.
In a 1 October letter, Smith asked Shukla, who is director of the independent Institute of Global Environment and Society (IGES) in Rockville, Maryland, to preserve all of the “email, electronic documents, and data” that the institute has created since 2009. Smith’s panel soon may be asking for those documents, the letter suggests.
The flap has its origins in calls from some climate advocates for the federal government to investigate industry-funded groups that have challenged climate science. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D–RI) discussed the idea this past May in an opinion piece for The Washington Post. He noted that federal prosecutors had used the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO)—originally developed to combat organized crime and corrupt unions—to sue the tobacco industry for covering up the health effects of smoking. And he suggested they could do the same to investigate fossil fuel firms that he charged were “funding a massive and sophisticated campaign to mislead the American people about the environmental harm caused by carbon pollution.”
Last month, 20 climate scientists, led by Shukla, picked up on the idea of using RICO. In a 1 September letter to President Barack Obama, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and White House science adviser John Holdren, they wrote that “if corporations in the fossil fuel industry and their supporters are guilty of the misdeeds that have been documented in book and journal articles, it is imperative that these misdeeds be stopped as soon as possible.”
Other signers of the RICO letter include climate researchers from George Mason as well as the University of Washington, Seattle; Rutgers University in New Jersey; the University of Maryland, College Park; and Columbia University.
Shukla, a professor at George Mason, is an expert in the seasonal variability of climate, as well as how land surfaces influence climate. He helped found IGES, which has housed research projects funded with grants from the National Science Foundation, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and NASA, according to the group’s website.
The RICO letter was “inadvertently” posted on the IGES website, according to a statement posted on the institute’s domain (which also notes that “[a]ll projects by IGES were completed in July 2015, and the IGES web site is in the process of being decommissioned”). The letter eventually came to the attention of outsiders, including science policy specialistRoger Pielke, Jr., of the University of Colorado, Boulder. Pielke, an active voice in debates over climate science and policy, called attention to the letter on Twitter, and also raised questions about IGES’s finances. Soon, journalists, including several associated with conservative news outlets, were writing about the letter and IGES. TheDaily Caller,for example, noted that “climate scientists asking Obama to prosecute skeptics got millions from U.S. taxpayers,” in a 21 September story.
Smith cites that story and others in his letter,which notes that “IGES appears to be almost fully funded by taxpayer money while simultaneously participating in partisan political activity by requesting a RICO investigation of companies and organizations that disagree with the Obama administration on climate change.” Smith notes his letter was prompted, in part, by the removal of the RICO letter from IGES’s website. Smith gives Shukla until 8 October to confirm that he is conforming to the letter’s request, as well as provide his committee with a list of IGES’s current and former employees.
Shukla could not be reached for an interview, but in an email to ScienceInsider expressed surprise at the storm the RICO letter has caused. “We can not believe the viciousness of attacks because we signed a letter as our civic duty with the ultimate goal of repairing our planet,” he wrote.
It’s not clear what exactly Smith’s committee will be investigating. A committee spokeswoman, Laura Crist, declined to say whether the panel was looking at whether public funds were misused for political purposes, or whether IGES might have violated its nonprofit status with political activity. [OMFG vs c4's?!]
The committee’s ranking Democrat, Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson (D–TX), said in a statement to ScienceInsider that, “since the letter contains no specific allegations, I am puzzled as to the Chairman’s intent in writing it. To be clear about my own position, I would resist any attempt to stifle the constitutionally protected right of any citizen, including the nation’s scientists, to engage in free speech without interference.”
The RICO letter has also drawn the attention of Christopher Horner, an attorney and senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a Washington, D.C.–based libertarian think tank that has criticized climate change research. Horner recently filed public records requests with several public universities that employ authors of the RICO letter. In a letter to the University of Texas, Austin, Horner asks for any emails over a roughly 4-month period from or to Robert Dickinson, one of the letter’s signers, containing the words “‘RICO’, racketeer, racketeering, DOJ, prosecute or prosecution.”
Horner has previously tangled with scientists over records requests for their emails. He was at the center of an unsuccessful effort several years ago to obtain the correspondence of climate scientist Michael Mann during his time at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
Horner says he filed the requests to see how the scientists, as employees at public universities, were involved. “If they believe this is part of their job, we will not dispute that, but instead would like to see how the institutions were used in this innovative application of public education resources,” he wrote in an email.
Dickinson, a climate modeler who studies how land surfaces interact with climate, says the RICO letter isn’t seeking to squelch individuals who question the science of climate change. His intended target is corporations.
“I heard energy industry scientists talking about global warming 30 years ago. And they disappeared and the lobbyists popped up,” Dickinson says. “I don’t know if anything can be done. But it seemed to me that there's been an obvious cover-up.”
The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment. The RICO letter scientists did get a letter back from Holdren, who wrote that although such legal matters were up to the Justice Department, “the Administration shares the concern expressed in the letter about the seriousness of the threat posed by climate change.”
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horner climate lawsuits
https://www.desmogblog.com/2019/01/26/competitive-enterprise-institute-climate-denial-target-nbc-cities-liability-suits
Competitive Enterprise Institute's Climate Denial Efforts Target Media, Cities Filing Liability Suits
By Guest • Saturday, January 26, 2019 - 03:47
Karen Savage, Climate Liability News. Crossposted from Climate Liability News.
The conservative think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute has been busily pressing forward with its mission to promote climate denial, using high-profile tactics like full-page ads in major newspapers. But it is also working behind the scenes, filing records requests to dig for information from cities filing climate liability suits and academics studying the topic.
As the science has grown definitive in tying global warming to the burning of fossil fuels, even oil companies have been forced to acknowledge the overwhelming scientific consensus and back away publicly from climate denial efforts. But CEI continues to double down on their mission to claim the science is not settled.
CEI made a splash this week by purchasing full-page ads in the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal taking issue with Meet the Press host Chuck Todd and NBC for refusing to give airtime to denialists during his Dec. 30 show about climate change.
The think tank has deep ties to the fossil fuel industry and has long worked to promote climate denial. And as municipalities have begun to sue fossil fuel companies, including Exxon, CEI has filed briefs and launched other campaignsdefending them.
According to Kert Davies, founder and director of the Climate Investigations Center, CEI’s most recent push is likely motivated by the increasing number of those lawsuits and investigations of the fossil fuel industry.
“CEI has a personal interest in how these lawsuits proceed because they had a contract with ExxonMobil Foundation from the 1990s — they got over $2 million through 2007 when Exxon abruptly dropped them,” said Davies, adding that he expects lawyers pressing suits against the company would want to see the contracts between CEI and Exxon during that period.
CEI’s tactics go beyond its attempts to sway public opinion.
Last year, CEIsued UCLA to obtain emails the organization said were exchanged between two UCLA climate law professors and state attorneys general offices involved in investigations of the oil giant.
An ethics complaint filed by another fossil fuel industry-backed group in December against then-New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood echoes areport written by CEI legal fellow Chris Horner. The report relied on public records requests to allege that attorneys general are involved in a coordinated scheme by private interests to hold oil giants responsible for climate change. That alleged conspiracy includes Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, who is also investigating Exxon for possible fraud.
Horner has also filed information requests with municipalities filing suit against the oil and gas industry, including Richmond and San Francisco. In those requests, he is seeking records related to a climate litigation-related briefing he said took place at Harvard in 2016 between activists, private attorneys and public employees of various states’ attorney general’s offices.
In July, he requested communication belonging to staff members in the Rhode Island attorney general’s office, after it became the first U.S. state to attempt to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for climate change by filing suit against 21 oil and gas companies.Horner’s request was for communication between special assistant attorney general Greg Schult, senior policy advisor Matthew Lenz and legal experts involved in climate litigation in other municipalities, including attorneyMatthew Pawa, Niskanen Center chief counsel David Bookbinderand director of climate policy Joseph Majkut.
Horner is also on the board of directors of the non-profit Government Accountability and Oversight, the organization behind Climate Litigation Watch, which posts public records obtained in an attempt to “expose the network of influence involving the litigation surrounding climate change.”
CEI has used full-page ads in major newspapers in previous campaigns to try to discredit climate action.
In one ad that appeared in The New York Times in 2016, CEI — along with more than 40 signatories — claimed that attorneys general across the country were abusing their power by attempting to silence the “debate” on climate science.
Between 1997 and 2014, those signatories and the organizations they representreceived more than $10 million from Exxon and the ExxonMobil Foundation and theyreceived more than $21 million from the Koch brothers, who have long funded climate denial efforts in support of their fossil fuel businesses.
Today, full-page ads in theWashington Post can cost $100,000 and more. Ads in the Wall Street Journal can top $325,000.
In a press release, CEI said the ads push back on Todd and NBC’s decision to “exclude guests who disagree with alarmists and calls for a real and open debate about the impacts of climate alarmist policies.”
“Sometimes, journalists like Chuck Todd are persuaded to join the activists in shutting down legitimate debate about policy issues and in those cases, we feel a duty to push back in defense of our rights and our policy positions,” a CEI spokesperson said in an email, adding that the organization’s requests for public records are made on their own initiative, and as part of this body of work defending their principles.
“Americans of all political stripes tune into NBC’s Meet the Press with the expectation that the great political issues of the day will be debated vigorously by guests representing a full range of viewpoints,” said CEI PresidentKent Lassman.
Because CEI does not disclose its donors, it’s unclear who is funding the current ads, but it has previously received funding directly from David Koch, as well as coal giantsMassey Energy Company andMurray Energy Corporation.
ExxonMobil was a publicly-acknowledged contributor to CEI for a number of years.
“In 2006, however, ExxonMobil publicly announced that it would cease its support for CEI and a number of other groups,” a CEI spokesperson said in an email.
NBC did not respond to a request for comment.
The ads fit into a long-running strategy to cloud the issue of climate science to the public.
CEI was named in a 1998 email to the American Petroleum Institute’s global climate science communications team as a possible funding recipient in a campaign to implement a “Climate Action Plan.”
According to that plan, “victory will be achieved” when people and the media are convinced there is significant uncertainty in climate science and “media coverage reflects balance on climate science and recognizes the validity of viewpoints that challenge the current ‘conventional wisdom.'”
Davies said in addition to potentially having to face an examination of its relationship with Exxon in the course of climate litigation, CEI has other concerns.
Davies pointed to a study published this week showing Greenland’s ice ismeltingfaster than previously thought and a recent Yalepoll showing that 73 percent of people in the U.S. understand climate change is occurring and 62 percent understand it is mostly human-caused.
“The evidence is in front of people, the weather‘s messed up, the climate’s messed up, the public opinion is moving away from CEI, and then they strike out at a national news broadcast for not including this extreme minority opinion that there’s nothing to worry about,” Davies said.
==
horner climate lawsuits (see horner AG hit report node)
ref
https://cei.org/AGclimatescheme
Law Enforcement for Rent (note series, gov't etc)
How Special Interests Fund Climate Policy through State Attorneys General
Christopher C. Horner • August 28, 2018
Author’s Note
This paper is based on documents obtained over two and a half years fromopen records requests and, in some cases, subsequent litigation. Due to the volume of records, not all cited records are included in the body of this paper. Key documents are provided in the paper’s appendix, which can be accessed at CEI.org. The complete collection of documents cited in this paper is available at ClimateLitigationWatch.org, a project of the nonprofit public interest law firm Government Accountability & Oversight.
Executive Summary
This paper details an extensive and elaborate campaign using electivelaw enforcement offices, in coordination with major donors and activist pressure groups, to attain a policy agenda that failed through the democratic process. The plan is revealed in emails and other public records obtained during two and a half years of requests under state open records laws. Most are being released now for the first time. Many were obtained only by court order in the face of a determined and coordinated resistance that one deputy attorney general foresaw, expressing early concerns over “an affirmative obligation to always litigate” requests looking into the effort.The paper details how donor-financed governance has expanded into dangerous and likely unconstitutional territory: state attorney general (AG) offices.
The plan traces back to 2012 when activists agreed to seek “a single sympathetic attorney general” to assist their cause. AGs began subpoenaing private parties’ records in service of a campaign of litigation against opponents of their climate policy agenda. The public records date to a July 2015 email in which Peter Frumhoff of the Union of Concerned Scientists confided the group’s involvement with AGs.
Those public records reveal the following:(a) donors introduced plaintiffs’ lawyers to AG offices (OAGs),
(b) a slideshow tour by plaintiffs’ lawyers recruiting OAGs to the effort, and
(c) senior attorneys from OAGs flying in—some at taxpayer expense and others on the donors’ tab, which had been run through a pressure group— for a briefing with “prospective funders” about “potential state causes of action against major carbon producers.” One presenter described this briefing as a“secret meeting.”It was secret enough that one AG litigated to withhold the agenda— under implausible claims of privilege—for a year and a half before being compelled by a court to release the lineup for what turned out to have been an AG-assisted fundraiser.
Those public records reveal the anatomy of what began as an “informal coalition” of AGs to use the legal system in pursuit of anovertly political agenda in coordination with activists and plaintiffs’ lawyers. That coalition disbanded under open records and media scrutiny, but it has now reconstituted through a program by which donors fund, privately hire, and place investigators and prosecutors in AG offices. It uses a nonprofit organization to pass the funding through and to provide the OAGs with a network of “pro bono” attorneys and public relations services. In return, OAGs provide office space to the privately hired prosecutors; agree they are there to “advanc[e] progressive clean energy, climate change, and environmental legal positions”; and provide regular reports about their work.
Led and funded by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, this scheme hires “Research Fellows,” which it then places as activist “Special Assistant Attorneys General.” All of the participating OAGs had to promise that this work would not get done but for this private funding. All OAGs also certified they are not violating the law by accepting privately funded prosecutors. At best, as several OAGs tacitly admit, this unprecedented arrangement operates in a gray area with neither prohibition nor authority. One state where the scheme is arguably illegal is New York, where disgraced former Attorney General Eric Schneiderman had a leading and organizing role at every stage of the campaign this paper describes.
The New York OAG openly boasted to a donor that its “need” for privately funded prosecutors was driven in part by the “significant strain on staff resources” that had been caused by its “non- litigation advocacy”—that described as its having “led” the resistance to the Trump administration. Importantly, the NYOAG also cited its campaign “building models for two different types of common law cases to seek compensation” from industries for supposedly having caused global warming; moreover, it “needs additional attorney resources to assist with this project.”On these bases and with a claim to having statutory authority to enter the unprecedented arrangement—a claim which on its face appears to be an invention—the NYOAG was awarded not one but two privately underwritten prosecutors.
This is the most dangerous example of a modus operandi we have found: it uses nonprofit organizations as pass-through entities by which donors can support elected officials to, in turn, use their offices to advance a specific set of policies favored by said donors. It also uses resources that legislatures will not provide and that donors cannot legally provide directly. The budget for climate policy work alone is in the tens of millions of dollars per year.
Across various levels of government—including mayors and governors—the bulk of this money is budgeted for pass-through nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and off-the-books consultants, report writers, and public relations (PR) firms that are hired through an NGO. The NGO takes a percentage as its fee (up to 24 percent in some cases). Another component involves privately hiring and then placing in-house, non- official personnel as advisors when they are actually employed by a donor’s group.
The extension of this billion-dollar per year climate industry to privately fund AG investigations sets a dangerous precedent. It represents private interests commandeering the state’s police powers to target opponents of their policy agenda and to hijack the justice system as a way to overturn the democratic process’s rejection of a political agenda.
As a subsequent report will affirm, this model of using nonprofit groups as cutouts for donors to finance elected officials’ activism is, in fact, widely adopted generally by the axisof donors, elected officials, and NGOs and by the climate litigation industryspecifically. The de facto law enforcement for hire by private interests raises concerns beyond mere political opportunism, obvious appearances of impropriety, or even compliant 501(c)3s that seeminglyrent out their tax-exempt status on behalf of activist donors.
The use of this approach by AGs carries legal, ethical, and constitutionalimplications, as well as for the integrity of law enforcement and the constitutional policy process. The public–private partnership of law enforcement for hire revealed in this report, in which the partnership uses public office to expend resources not appropriated or approved by their legislatures, raises significant constitutional and other legal issues—as well as ethics concerns—and should be the subject of prompt and serious legislative oversight.
Introduction
BEFORE YOU GASP, PLEASE NOTE that foundations are currently spending over $1 billion a year on climate work.”1 So wrote Dan Carol, a senior aide to California Governor Jerry Brown(D), on October 3, 2017, to his colleagues and staff members for New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) and Washington Governor Jay Inslee (D) regarding charitable foundation spending that promotes their climate policy agenda (see Figure 1). This figure dwarfs spending in opposition to that agenda—efforts to portray matters otherwise notwithstanding.2
Carol offered this sum to make his case that $50 million per year is reasonable to ask so donors can privately underwrite an off-the-books network of “support functions” for a handful of governors’ climate policy advocacy.
In further support of his position, Carol attached a “draft agenda, presentation slides, and budget worksheet.”Those items are among a large cache of public records that were obtained by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), along with other public policy groups, and that detail and propose the exploitation of a “plethora of funder interest” in secretly bankrolling the public office holders’ use of their positions to take a more aggressive role concerning climate politics and policy.
This years-long campaign by substantial, left-leaning donors revealed in Carol’s email correspondence and in other emails produced under state open records laws has now expanded into dangerous and likely unconstitutional territory. Led and funded by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, this scheme centers
..[long]
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ref2
https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2018/12/12/ucla-law-professor-ann-carlson-cara-horowitz-cei/
Marco Poggio
A conservative think tank with deep ties to the fossil fuel industry has sued UCLA to obtain email correspondence between two UCLA climate law professors and pro-environment individuals involved in climate change litigation.
The lawsuit was filed last month in California Superior Court by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), a libertarian group that lobbies against limits on greenhouse gas emissions and claims that CO2 is good for the environment. CEI argued the university hasn’t complied with two public record requests made in February and May under the California Public Records Act.
According to the lawsuit, :{Competitive Enterprise Institute v. Regents of the University of California:(style="box-sizing:inherit"):}:*,*the emails show environmental law professors Cara Horowitz and Ann E. Carlson discussed future meetings with others, including staffers from several attorney general offices, to discuss new legal actions against major carbon producers.
The lawsuit mimics the ones filed to obtain email correspondence by several climate scientists, including prominent climatologist Michael Mann of Penn State, which was ended by the Virginia Supreme Court in 2012. Another continues to embroil University of Arizona scientists Jonathan Overpeck and Malcolm Hughes, who were recently ordered to release 13 years of emails demanded by another fossil fuel ally.
“This appears to be yet another effort by hired guns funded by polluting interests to badger, intimidate, and silence scientists whose findings prove inconvenient to those who continue to profit from our dependence on fossil fuels,” Mann said of the suit against UCLA.
Among the emails Horowitz and Carlson have been asked to release are those exchanged with litigators in direct contact with offices of pro-environment attorneys general around the country. That includes former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who in 2015 began investigating Exxon for possible climate change-related fraud.
Carlson told Climate Liability News that UCLA is working on complying with CEI’s record request, sorting through hundreds of emails.
“I don’t feel intimidated. I don’t have anything to hide,” Carlson said, “I don’t have a problem, so far, with what I’ve been required to turn over.
“I do worry that these tactics, more broadly, are designed to discourage public discourse about important topics, like climate change and who should pay for climate damages.”
Specifically, CEI has asked for correspondence between the two UCLA scholars andShaun Goho, a Harvard lecturer and environmental lawyer with a record of environmental litigation in state and federal court.
Goho said the lawsuit is just an harassment tactic meant to divert the energy and resources of people fighting climate change away from their work.
“I don’t see how academics speaking with government officials about matters of public concern is a conspiracy. It doesn’t seem to make sense to me,” Goho said.
“This lawsuit doesn’t stand alone. It’s really part of a broader campaign by fossil fuels companies and their allies to harass people who are taking action trying to try to address climate change in various ways, whether it’s climate scientists, lawyers or others who are researching legal issues related to climate change and the relationship between climate change and the fossil fuel industry.”
CEI has deep ties to the fossil fuel industry. Exxon was its biggest funder until 2006, when public criticism pushed the company to distance itself from CEI’s climate denial campaigns.
CEI has also sought emails containing the names of other pro-environment lawyers and climate scientists, including Peter Frumhoff, the director of science and policy at the Union of Concerned Scientists,and Sharon Eubanks, one of the attorneys involved in the federal tobacco litigation against Philip Morris.
Additionally, CEI demanded emails regarding two separate events—one held at Harvard and one at UCLA—attended by Carlson and Horowitz and employees of various state attorney general offices, private lawyers,academics and environmental activists, who were set to discuss causes of action against major carbon producers.
“Public records show that Professors Horowitz and Carlson are using their positions at your public university to coordinate with certain activists groups in organizing andpursuing law enforcement and civil investigations and litigation against private opponents of a particular political agenda.We seek correspondence and other records illuminating this use of a public university faculty position and resources,” the request’s text reads.
Frumhoff declined to comment for this story.
Central to the lawsuit are the UCLA and Harvard meetings, in which Carlson, Horowitz and other parties discussed legal actions against polluters.
The “secret meetings” as they were described in some of the emails, were attended byFrumhoff and Matthew Pawa, a lawyer with Hagens Berman, which is involved in several climate liability suits filed by communities against the fossil fuel industry. Those meetings also included staffers from attorney general offices around the country, including those of New York and California.
A CEI representative declined to comment, citing pending litigation, but referred to the organization’s website for a statement concerning the lawsuit.
“This ‘secret meeting’ agenda shows UCLA faculty briefed the attorneys general and prospective donors on potential legal actions they could pursue. Attorneys general are now pursuing the types of investigations urged by UCLA faculty,” Chris Horner, a senior fellow at CEI who signed the petition, wrote in the statement.
“Thisdonor-funded scheme of using law enforcement to pursue a failed political agenda, raises significant constitutional and other legal issues,as well as ethics concerns. With the revelation that this involves the use of public institutions in this mercenary campaign, the public has a right to knowwhat their employees are doingin their name, and on their dime,” Horner’s statement said the statement continues.
In its lawsuit, CEI claimed the subject matter contained in the emails is of “great public interest”and that the university has violated the California Constitution because delays in handing over the records practically meant a refusal to comply with the request.
The lawsuit presents new challenges to law practitioners in the field of environmental litigation, paving the way for an aggressive use of public record access law that some fear would stymie the process of accountability of carbon producers.
“I don’t know exactly where this is all leading. I do think it’s part of a broader campaign to try to divert attention away from oil industry’s own activities and own efforts to try to dissuade the public about the legitimacy and validity of climate science, and I worry about that,” Carlson said.
The use of public record access laws as a tool to hit back critics in the academic world is a fairly recent practice embraced by trade groups of several industries, not just oil and gas, to target opponents.
“Requests can be burdensome on government agencies,” said David Snyder, an expert in California public record access law who directs the First Amendment Coalition, a nonprofit nonpartisan advocacy group that promotes free speech and public access to government information.
The law effectively puts academics in the same position as public officials that might have strong interests in not having their communications disclosed to the public.
“It seems like an odd fit, I acknowledge, for a college professor to sit in the same category as officials at city hall or at the governor’s office,” Snyder said. “Nonetheless, UCLA is a public agency, and employees of that public agency are subject to the public records act.”
A study compiled by the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund, a nonprofit providing legal assistance to researchers, ranked each of the 50 states based on the level of protection from open records laws they grant to scientists working at publicly-funded institutions.
Only three states, Delaware, Maine, and Pennsylvania, exclude some forms of scientific and academic research from their open records laws. Laws in four other states, including Arkansas, Montana, New Mexico and North Carolina, contain no protection for researchers whatsoever. The remaining states guarantee different types of statutory exemption, deliberative process exemption and balancing tests that offer different degrees of protection.
“The breadth and strength of state open records laws and the federal equivalent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) have made them powerful tools, but have also made them vulnerable to misuse and abuse by groups who try to harass researchers and stifle scientific research they dislike,” the study reads.
The right to exemption from having to turn over documents is often hard to balance with the right to access public records, which is critical to ensure transparency in institutions, Snyder said.
“It’s tricky,” Snyder said. “Under the public records act, by design, government agencies are not allowed to single out the requesters based on the reasons for which they want the records.”
“They can’t say, ‘we’re not gonna give you the records because we know that you espouse these views, because you want to use the records for this purpose,’ that’s expressly forbidden,” Snyder said. “You don’t want the government picking sides.”
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e&e implodes, splits
cf GW rico and our children, also cities, team blue
this is new content 6/15 and i think archive of older
capt917
==
just tag? e&e tag
==
https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060084931
no lnx
Back to E&E News index page.
EPA
Pruitt science plan may block use of major Harvard study
Corbin Hiar, E&E News reporter
Greenwire: Monday, June 18, 2018
Joseph Allen and green building study. Photo credit: @WorldGBC/Twitter]
Harvard University researcher Joseph Allen speaks about the results of a green building study in 2016. @WorldGBC/Twitter
This story was updated June 19 at 2:38 p.m. EDT.
Harvard University is working on an international survey that researchers believe could revolutionize the world's understanding of how buildings affect public health.
There's just one problem: Because of a change to scientific standards proposed by Administrator Scott Pruitt, EPA regulators likely won't be able to use the study's findings to better protect Americans.
"This speaks to the central issue with that regulation," Harvard's Joseph Allen, the principal investigator of the global buildings study said of EPA's regulatory science transparency proposal.
"All of our work, of course, is peer reviewed in top academic journals and has gone through that process that we've all used for many decades now," said Allen, who is also co-director of Harvard's new Center for Climate, Health and the Global Environment, or C-CHANGE. "But it has the same limitations as all of our research in this domain."
The three-year-long global buildings study — like almost all public health research — is based on sensitive personal data that Allen's team has promised will remain confidential.
Harvard and SUNY Upstate Medical University, which is also working on the project, have begun collecting information on the health and cognitive function of a group of people that will eventually include thousands of workers in 100 buildings across the globe.
But EPA's transparency proposal, which mirrors a plan from a former tobacco industry lawyer who served on the agency's transition team, would make it very difficult for EPA staffers to take into account the global buildings study and other public health research when crafting major regulations.
That's because "the proposed regulation provides that, for the science pivotal to its significant regulatory actions, EPA will ensure that the data and models underlying the science is publicly available in a manner sufficient for validation and analysis," the draft rule says.
Significant regulatory actions are ones that the regulators determine could have an annual effect on the economy of at least $100 million, could materially affect certain states or economic sectors, or raise legal or federal budgetary issues. New building ventilation standards, for instance, would likely be considered significant.
EPA says "nothing in the proposed rule compels the disclosure of any confidential or private information in a manner that violates applicable legal and ethical protections."
But Andrew Rosenberg, a former federal scientist who is now at the Union of Concerned Scientists advocacy group, believes it would be virtually impossible to anonymize all of the personal information Allen and his team are collecting. Even if the names of participants were redacted, he argued, their identities could be deduced based on the building they work in.
"There's absolutely no reason that anyone needs to see the raw data to decide whether the science is credible and legitimate," said Rosenberg, who was deputy director of the NOAA Fisheries during the Clinton administration.
"I review many, many papers for top-tier journals every year," he said. "I don't review the raw data. I look at the methodology and the summary statistics and the results and so on. That's the general process that all reviewers follow."
The proposal also allows Pruitt to exempt certain studies from the transparency requirements on a case-by-case basis, which Rosenberg says would give a pass to research conducted by politically favored industry players.
Big tobacco ties
Using data requirements to exclude important public health research from EPA consideration may very well be the point of Pruitt's transparency proposal, according to Rosenberg, Allen and other critics in the scientific community (Climatewire, April 25).
"This administration long ago signaled its intent to dismantle important environmental protections at the expense of our collective health, and they are acting on that promise," the Harvard researcher said.
Christopher Horner, who helped shape EPA in the early days of the Trump administration, urged the tobacco industry in 1996 to push for similar "sound science" criteria in the federal rulemaking process.
At the time, Horner was a lawyer at the firm Bracewell & Patterson LLP, and his client, the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., was worried about growing scientific evidence of the dangers posed by secondhand tobacco smoke. To prevent agencies from using health studies to support curbs on smoking, Horner suggested "addressing process as opposed to scientific substance."
Specifically, he wrote that one of the criteria for "sound science" should be "can the answer be reproduced from the record?"
The laborious requirement would help provide "a new mechanism to control EPA and other regulatory bodies," he wrote. The end goal is to avoid "to the extent possible specific scientific issues, contaminants, or industries."
The memo, first reported by The Intercept, was produced during litigation between state attorneys general and the tobacco industry and collected by the University of San Francisco.
Rosenberg sees a direct connection between Horner's "secret science" plan for the tobacco industry and the science transparency proposal pushed by Pruitt, whose political career has been bankrolled by fossil fuel companies concerned about climate science.
"They use the same tactics" to prevent the adoption of cutting-edge public health research, he said. "All it does is delay. It has no function. It doesn't improve the scientific evidence, it doesn't make people healthier, it doesn't do anything."
Horner, who is now a senior fellow at the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute think tank, defended his memo to E&E News as "a set of simple rules of good scientific conduct that judges can easily follow without attempting to step into the shoes of scientists." He added, "Codification of such transparency requirements would protect against regulatory excess across industry lines by promoting accountability, transparency, and checks and balances in rulemaking."
CEI has also come out strongly in favor of Pruitt's science overhaul.
"If the government is going to make policy based on research, we need transparency so that the scientific community at large can validate it," senior fellow Angela Logomasini said in a statement. "And furthermore, researchers should want their work to be transparent—that makes their work more policy relevant and their research stronger and better. It should be rare when data has to be kept private, but today failure and even refusal to release data is all too common."
Yet the transparency proposal is already prompting confusion within EPA. For instance, the top career official responsible for safeguarding the nation's drinking water supply last month couldn't say how the rule would affect its efforts to protect the public from toxic nonstick chemicals (em>Greenwire, May 24).
EPA didn't respond to requests for comment on the Harvard study and the science proposal. The agency is accepting public comments on the proposal through mid-August (Greenwire, May 24).
Regardless of what happens at EPA, Allen is hopeful that the results of his study can still help improve the lives of Americans, nearly all of whom either live or work in buildings.
"By working with good companies, on a market-based approach, using sound science, we can continue to advance both the planet and the economy," he said, pointing to a collaboration between C-CHANGE and Google to reduce the use of dangerous chemicals in home and office furnishings (Greenwire, May 31).
"So everyone wins in our vision of public health," Allen said.
Twitter: @corbinhiar Email: chiar@eenews.net
==
https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/390638-big-tobaccos-smoke-and-mirrors-revived-by-pruitts-science
It turns out that the tobacco wars never ended.
It has been nearly 25 years since the first state lawsuits were filed against the tobacco industry, revealing that big tobacco had been deliberately seeking to cast unwarranted doubt on the science linking smoking with cancer. The tobacco companies lost that battle, but it is now clear that the war did not end but simply shifted arenas.
The same shady tactics are being used today by many of the same characters to try to create false uncertainty about the science demonstrating the public health risks of pollution. And their newest recruit is the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt recently proposed a new rule that will prevent the EPA from considering any scientific study unless all of its underlying data are made publicly available. Pruitt’s EPA claims this change in policy would improve the transparency and reproducibility of the science guiding agency actions.
In reality, it would preclude EPA from considering many important scientific studies that examine the effects of chemicals and pollutants on human health because they often rely on research whose underlying data cannot be made public because it contains confidential personal medical information.
Using the false mantle of transparency to cast doubt on public health science and create barriers to regulations is not a new idea. It is a decades-old industry trope pioneered by tobacco companies concerned about the increasing number of studies linking tobacco smoke with health problems. Big Tobacco realized the best chance of avoiding regulation lay not in attempting to combat each study as it came out, but rather in changing the standards to which those studies were held. To do this, they sought to use transparency and reproducibility as rhetorical cover to raise questions about the reliability of the science on secondhand smoke.
In a memo written for R.J. Reynolds in 1996, lawyer Chris Horner explained that the goal of this so-called “secret science” strategy is to create “explicit procedural hurdles” that will hinder EPA and other agencies’ review of unfavorable scientific studies. The game-plan described by Horner was famously carried out by a lawyer named Steve Milloy, who for years headed an industry-funded PR group for Phillip Morris called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASCC),and who has by his own account made a career of advocating for the secret science agenda.
This tactic of using the banner of “transparency” and “sound science” as a guise to prevent regulation has been enthusiastically adopted and adapted by others seeking to prevent regulation of air pollution, including greenhouse gases. In fact, Horner and Milloy have both gone on to work with an organization called the Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal), a coal-funded climate denial group. Following the “secret science” playbook, E&E Legal has weaponized transparency laws in hopes that it can uncover emails it can use to discredit and embarrass climate scientists.
While the strategy behind the rule Pruitt proposed in April is not new, what is new is that it now has strong supporters among EPA leadership, and its proponents have significant, direct influence on EPA policy. To illustrate: EPA developed the proposed rule after consultation with staff for House Science Committee Chairman Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) who’s tried, and failed, to pass similar legislation. And remember former tobacco lobbyists Chris Horner and Steve Milloy? They were both members of the Trump EPA transition team. Though some members of the press were not allowed at the announcement of this “transparency” initiative, Smith and Milloy were both in attendance.
This coordinated assault on science in the name of transparency will ultimately harm not only the health of the American people, but the scientific endeavor as a whole. If regulators arbitrarily deny important findings from scientific studies simply because they rely on confidential health information, subsequent policies won’t adequately protect us from pollution or accurately account its public health costs.
Good scientists may understandably hesitate to pursue important lines of scientific inquiry if doing so will make them targets for regulators, interest groups and legislators who seek to impugn their credibility and troll through their emails looking for ways to publicly embarrass them. When sound science is disparaged and ignored, we all lose.
Transparency in scientific research and policy making is critically important, and real improvements could be made. In the case of EPA, the agency could respond to legitimate FOIA requests and inquiries from Congress in a complete and timely manner. It could restore the ability of scientists who are EPA grant recipients to serve on advisory committees. It could put back the information about climate change it has removed from its websites. It could ensure that EPA scientists and grantees are allowed to conduct their research without interference, and to discuss it with the public and at professional conferences with their peers.
But restricting the EPA’s ability to consider significant amounts of relevant scientific evidence bearing directly on its core mission is not transparency. It’s smoke and mirrors.
Augusta Wilson is an attorney for the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund
==
3/19 watnow checkin, schnare just popped up
https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/climate-change/b/climate-change-blog/posts/litigation-seeking-climate-scientists-emails-for-transparency-has-been-secretly-paid-for-by-the-coal-industry
columbia law
March2015, an Arizona trial court validated the University of Arizona’s denial of massive records requests by Energy & Environment Legal (“E&E Legal”), which sought 13 years of climate scientists’ emails under Arizona open records laws.[1] E&E Legal, formerly named the American Tradition Institute, claimed it wanted these emails for its “transparency project.”[2] The group has been described as having “a core mission of discrediting climate science and dismantling environmental regulations,”[3] and E&E Legal openly admitted its litigation was seeking documents it could use to embarrass researchers.[4] Many in the scientific community applauded the court’s ruling,[5] but E&E Legal was less pleased and it recently appealed the decision.
In its appeal, E&E Legal claims that the trial court misinterpreted Arizona’s open records laws, which balance duties of government transparency with protections deemed in “the best interests of the state.”[6] In particular, E&E Legal claims that the trial court erred by giving deference to the University’s determination, and the court improperly considered whether the University had “abuse[d] its discretion or act[ed] arbitrarily or capriciously” in withholding the emails.[7] Instead, E&E Legal claims, the trial court should have considered both sides’ arguments equally and analyzed them de novo.[8] E&E Legal has asked for a remand to the trial court for reanalysis or, in the alternative, a new analysis by the appellate court.[9]
E&E Legal has been called “a free-market think tank that wants the public to believe human-caused global warming is a scientific fraud,”[10] and its tactics include “filing nuisance suits to disrupt important academic research.”[11] The group also “has connections with the Koch brothers, Art Pope and other conservative donors seeking to expand their political influence.”[12]
Recent bankruptcy filings by coal producer Alpha Natural Resources (“ANR”), analyzed by The Intercept, also reveal that E&E Legal’s work has been funded by the coal industry.[13] These bankruptcy filings list line item descriptions of ANR contractors and grant recipients, which includes distributions to E&E Legal attorney Christopher Horner, as well the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic (“FMELC”), which operates as litigation counsel for E&E Legal.[14] (FMELC’s business address is also the home ofDavid Schnare, the general counsel for E&E Legal, and FMELC is staffed solely by attorneys who also work for E&E Legal.[15]) A representative from the Union of Concerned Scientists described the ANR money to FMELC and Horner as essentially “funding the harassment of scientists.”[16] Chris Horner was also a featured speaker at the 2015 Coal and Investment Leadership Forum, an invitation-only retreat that brings together coal industry executives, Republican donors, and other “stakeholders.”[17]
Despite the groups’ transparency directives, FEMC director and E&E Legal general counsel David Schnare declined to give reporters additional details on ANR funding, and sent an email “neither confirming nor denying that Horner or his organizations have received funding from the coal giant.”[18] Horner has previously declined to comment on his relationship with coal companies.[19] Schnare told reporters that “nearly all” of their donors “request that we not disclose their names,” and noted that IRS regulations do not require disclosure.[20]
Lauren Kurtz is the Executive Director of the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund, which seeks to protect the scientific endeavor. For more information, please visit climatesciencedefensefund.org
[1] https://s3.amazonaws.com/ucs-documents/science-and-democracy/19966054.pdf#sthash.a52aOaNb.dpuf
[2] http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/climatechange/2015/03/31/arizona-court-upholds-protections-for-scientific-research-and-correspondence/
[3] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/may/09/climate-change-american-tradition-insitute#sthash.HW6Cox63.dpuf
[4] http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/climatechange/2015/03/31/arizona-court-upholds-protections-for-scientific-research-and-correspondence/
[5] http://blog.ucsusa.org/arizona-superior-court-protects-academic-freedom-in-climate-email-disclosure-case-682; http://www.aaup.org/brief/energy-environment-legal-institute-v-arizona-board-regents-no-c2013-4963-arizona-superior; https://twitter.com/TucsonPeck/status/582608218872012800
[6] At the trial level, the University of Arizona successfully argued that academic free thought and expression should be protected because it was in the best interests of the state, an established protection under Arizona law. For more on the trial court decision, see here: http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/climatechange/2015/03/31/arizona-court-upholds-protections-for-scientific-research-and-correspondence/
[7] Energy & Environment Legal Institute v. Arizona Board of Regents, Arizona Court of Appeals Division II, Appellant’s Opening Brief dated July 24, 2015.
[8] E&E Legal’s claim for a different standard of review is predicated on their claim that, because it sought to force the University to produce thousands of emails, E&E Legal was effectively making a petition for mandamus, and writs of mandamus are accorded de novoreview. In its opening brief, E&E Legal acknowledges this argument is supported “by example rather than through direct statement.”
[9] Energy & Environment Legal Institute v. Arizona Board of Regents, Arizona Court of Appeals Division II, Appellant’s Opening Brief dated July 24, 2015.
[10] http://www.southernstudies.org/2011/10/special-investigation-whos-behind-the-information-attacks-on-climate-scientists.html
[11] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/may/09/climate-change-american-tradition-insitute
[12] http://www.southernstudies.org/2011/10/special-investigation-whos-behind-the-information-attacks-on-climate-scientists.html
[13] https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/08/25/chris-horner-coal
[14] http://pdfs.citizenaudit.org/2013_06_EO/45-1602963_990EZ_201212.pdf
[15] http://pdfs.citizenaudit.org/2014_08_EO/45-1602963_990_201312.pdf
[16] https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/08/25/chris-horner-coal/
[17] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/29/jeb-bush-closed-door-meeting-coal-industry-barons
[18] https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/08/25/chris-horner-coal/
[19] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/29/jeb-bush-closed-door-meeting-coal-industry-barons
[20] https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/08/25/chris-horner-coal/
5/18
https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/05/15/pence-coal-funded-lawyer-chris-horner-climate-litigation-watch-attack
2x
==
no lnx
https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060047057
Back to E&E News index page.
EPA
Agency's FOIA adversary now on the inside
Kevin Bogardus, E&E News reporter
Greenwire: Monday, December 12, 2016
Christopher Horner
Christopher Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, has hounded U.S. EPA records relentlessly for years. He is now a member of President-elect Donald Trump's transition team for the agency. Photo courtesy of C-SPAN.
Christopher Horner, a relentless hunter of U.S. EPA documents, is now allowed inside the agency's walls.
Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, is a member of President-elect Donald Trump's agency landing team for EPA, the transition team announced Friday. As part of the landing team, Horner can have access to EPA facilities and records — including non-public information, with some restrictions — under a memorandum of understanding signed between the outgoing and incoming administrations.
Access to EPA documents is something Horner has always prized. He has hounded EPA for years on all matter of records — emails, text messages and smartphone bills, often from its top brass — first through Freedom of Information Act requests and then frequently by litigation. His biggest discovery was an alternative government email address used by former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson under the alias "Richard Windsor," named after Jackson's dog and the town where she grew up.
The fact that Horner is on Trump's transition team for EPA worries some former agency officials.
"I think it's deeply troubling that a guy who has relentlessly pursued the EPA administrator over the legitimate and accepted practice of using an alias for email management purposes would be on the Trump transition team," said Bob Sussman, once a senior policy adviser to Jackson and EPA deputy administrator during the Clinton administration.
Horner referred questions from E&E News to the Trump transition team. A transition team spokeswoman said Horner was not available for interviews at this time.
Horner's selection for the transition effort was cheered by conservatives active in energy and environmental policy.
On Friday, Phil Kerpen, president of free-market group American Commitment, wrote on Twitter, "I would love to see the faces of the rank-and-file when @Chris_C_Horner lands at the EPA."
Chris Warren, vice president of communications at the American Energy Alliance, said, "Chris Horner is a great pick."
Warren added, "He's worked relentlessly to try to make the EPA more transparent and to uncover misdeeds by the agency. What does the national environmental lobby have against government transparency?"
Horner's pursuit of EPA documents also found that Jackson had used a personal email address for official agency business. That led to allegations from Horner and Republican lawmakers that the EPA chief had used the other email accounts to duck FOIA and record-keeping regulations.
Nevertheless, EPA's inspector general in September 2013 cleared Jackson and other senior agency officials, saying they didn't use personal email to skirt federal rules (E&E News PM, Sept. 30, 2013).
Other findings by the agency watchdog have angered Horner in the past.
In July 2014, the IG found that there was no bias against conservative groups regarding who was being assessed FOIA fees by the agency. That finding "strains credulity," Horner said at the time. He was acting as counsel to CEI as well as the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, another conservative-leaning group (Greenwire, July 16, 2014).
Sussman said Horner being part of the transition was a bad omen for the agency under Trump.
"Horner's record is one of deep hostility to EPA as an institution, and his involvement seems to reflect an inquisitional mindset and not a respectful handoff from one administration to another," Sussman said.
Horner's status as a vocal EPA critic stems from his disbelief in climate change science.
He has authored books including "Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed" and "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism." He also has tangled with climate scientists, such as Michael Mann, filing public records requests and then suing for their emails.
Horner has testified before Congress, and his EPA records finds have served as fodder for Republicans critical of the agency.
Horner earned his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis and is also a senior legal fellow at E&E Legal, which is not affiliated with E&E News. He has never been far from the airwaves or print, having been quoted in several newspapers and even appearing on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" back in 2007.
Horner has been linked to funding from the coal industry.
Bankrupt coal company Alpha Natural Resources Inc. paid him $18,600 between May and July last year. Horner said he was acting as a lawyer for Alpha, adding that "any attempt to draw financial connection between my practice of law and my public policy work is misplaced" (Climatewire, Oct. 19, 2015).
Lauren Kurtz, executive director of the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund, has battled Horner in court in the past over climate change scientists' records. She said Horner's spot on Trump's transition team was disturbing.
"It is horrifying," Kurtz said. "He is someone who doesn't believe in environmental protections, nor does he accept climate change."
But asked about Horner now having access to EPA records, Warren at AEA said, "It's great news for transparency and for good government."
Trump has picked several other EPA critics for his agency landing team, including David Schnare, general counsel for E&E Legal. Like Horner, Schnare has used FOIA to embarrass EPA in the past.
Kurtz disagreed with Warren's assessment that Horner and others like him being picked for the transition team was a win for transparency.
"They put it under this umbrella of being a pro-transparency group and doing it in the public interest. Once they're inside the government, I feel they will continue their bad acts of attacking scientists and dismantling regulations but not continuing their transparency initiatives," Kurtz said.
Twitter: @KevinBogardus Email: kbogardus@eenews.net
==
https://www.csldf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/CSLDF-Amicus-Brief-Arizona-July-2018.pdf
Egregious attacks on science are escalating. So we spent July fighting for researchers, evidence, and facts. Here's what we've been up to.
Arizona Case Update: We filed our fourth legal brief in support of the University of Arizona and its ongoing effort to keep scientists’ private files out of the hands of a conservative group that seeks to inhibit, discredit, and distort established climate science. This case has bounced around Arizona state courts since 2013 and is now before the Arizona Supreme Court in a special action.
Our brief, filed in partnership with the American Meteorological Society and Pfizer, Inc., argues that scientists must be protected from invasive attempts—like the ones in this case—to misuse open records laws to obtain their confidential correspondence and research materials. Forcing the release of such documents will set a dangerous precedent and be extremely damaging to the scientific endeavor....
Conservative Legal Group in Limbo:David Schnare is a leader in the effort to discredit climate scientists through invasive legal attacks, including the Arizona case discussed above. Now Schnare’s former colleagues are suing him for alleged financial mismanagement, attempted extortion, and faking documents. Lauren Kurtz, our director, recently discussed the case with *The New York Times*.
fight: WT BS ben
GOP in control of the White House and Congress, conservatives are finally poised to mount a coordinated attack on federal environmental regulations — but some of their strength is being sapped by a nasty fight inside one of the movement’s key advocates.
The Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, which gained notoriety for challenging a host of Obama-era rules, was founded in 2011 and has been home for several pro-Trump figures.
But they’re now feuding amid allegations of extortion, lying to the IRS, harassment and other mismanagement that threatens to shutter the law clinic just as it should be providing muscle for President Trump’s push to free the economy of burdensome regulations.
One side of the fight is led by Chris Horner, a conservative attorney perhaps best known for exposing former Environmental Protection Agency chief Lisa Jackson’s use of secret non-government email addresses. He also served on the Trump administration’s EPA transition team.
On the other side is David Schnare, a veteran EPA employee who led the law clinic until early last year, when he again accepted an appointment at the agency. His second stint at the EPA lasted just two months amid widespread reports of deep disagreements with EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.
After he left the law clinic, his former colleagues said they discovered a list of improprieties. In court papers they say Mr. Schnare abused the organization’s tax-exempt status, misappropriated funds and tried to use the organization’s assets as his own, and later tried to extort the group, demanding a huge cash payout to hide his actions.
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https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/05/15/pence-coal-funded-lawyer-chris-horner-climate-litigation-watch-attack
For a group apparently hooked on transparency, the latest organization to spring from the loins of the fossil fuel–funded climate science denial industry certainly manages to obscure one or two pertinent facts.
Government Accountability and Oversight (GAO) — the name of the group given public charity status on March 20, 2018 by the Internal Revenue Service — is promising to publish documents about the people and groups behind ongoing court cases against the energy industry and its impact on the global climate.
“We’re not going to get into the science debate and other arguments. We’ll just show the public the documents, so you can decide,” lawyer Chris Horner told a sympathetic Daily Caller about GAO’s Climate Litigation Watch (CLW) project.
Behind the group are three lawyers — one a Republican-elected district attorney, another a former radio host and “longtime friend” of Vice President Mike Pence, and Horner, who has been paid by coal companies and works at the fossil fuel–funded Competitive Enterprise Institute.
While apparently not wanting to “get into the science debate,” Climate Litigation Watch says the science linking fossil fuel producers to climate change is “dubious” — a position at odds with every major scientific academy on the planet.
So, who are these characters behind the GAO and its sole project, Climate Litigation Watch?
Christopher Horner's Coal Cash
According to Horner’s profile on the GAO and Climate Litigation Watch sites, he has been a lawyer for 25 years and his clients “have included policy groups, scientists, and members of the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate on matters of environmental policy, in addition to providing regulatory counsel to effected parties.”
Let’s fill in some gaps there, becuase there are some very large ones.
In the mid-1990s, Horner’s clients included cigarette maker R.J. Reynolds, which he suggested should back his idea to “construct explicit procedural hurdles” within the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that would make it harder for the agency to use scientific findings as justification for new rules that would inconvenience certain industries.
According to official lobbying disclosures, in the late 1990s and early 2000s Horner also lobbied for the Chemical Manufacturers Association, paint company Dunn Edwards, infamous energy company Enron, and others.
Horner is a long-standing climate science denier, who has regularly appeared on conservative media including Fox News to talk about climate change policy and energy. He is known for his pursuit of climate scientists and their emails.
In 2015, it was revealed that Horner had been paid $18,600 that year by coal company Alpha Natural Resources. Months later, it emerged that Horner’s Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal) also had a financial relationship with Arch Coal. When coal giant Peabody filed for bankruptcy in 2016, E&E Legal and the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic(FMELC), where Horner has also worked, appeared on the list of creditors.E&E Legal has received funding from FMELC.
Horner evaded questions about his coal funding during the premiere of a climate science denial film in Paris in 2015.
Horner, who was part of President Donald Trump’s EPA transition team, established FMELC with lawyer David Schnare. Schnare, an EPA veteran and transition team member, and Horner are currently at each other’s throats over accusations of financial malpractice at FMELC.
Commonwealth Attorney
Horner’s new GAO venture includes on its board of directors lawyer andRepublican Matthew Hardin, the elected district attorney for Greene County, Virginia, a role known in Virginia as the Commonwealth Attorney.
The GAO (which perhaps intentionally has the same initials as the Government Accountability Office, which is a federal oversight agency) is registered to a residential address in Stanardsville, Greene County, Virginia, which public records show is owned by Hardin.
In 2015, Hardin represented FMELC and E&E Legal in a joint court filing as it tried to pursue the EPA for emails between staff and several environment groups in relation to discussions about the upcoming Paris climate change talks.
Mike Pence's Longtime Friend
A third director listed at GAO is Greg Garrison, a lawyer and recently retired radio host. Garrison is best known as the prosecutor who in 1992 successfully gained the conviction of boxer Mike Tyson for rape charges.
Garrison says he is a “longtime friend” of Vice President Mike Pence. In 2000, Garrison took over WIBC radio hosting duties from Pence, who was elected to Congress that year. Pence regularly appeared on Garrison's show.
In March 2018, Garrison described the science of human-caused climate change. He said: “The whole thing has been a hoax, a snare, and a delusion always.”
The Free Market Environmental Law Clinic (FMELC), formerly known as the George Mason Environmental Law Clinic, operates as litigation counsel for the Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal). According to public tax forms, FMELC's business address is the home of David Schnare, the general counsel for E&E Legal. The group shares staff with attorneys working for E&E Legal. [1]
According to the 2012 IRS filing of the George Mason Environment Law Clinic (EIN 4516021963), “The law clinic serves as the attorneys for the American Tradition Institute. The billable hours in these matters is shared by the FME Law Clinic and ATI, the division made on a case by case basis.” The American Tradition Instituteis the former name for E&E Legal.
According to its website, “FME Law seeks to provide a counter-weight to the litigious environmental movement that fosters an economically destructive regulatory regime in the United States.” [2]
The FMELC originallymaintained its own website at fmelawclinic.org, however that URL now redirects to the Energy and Environment Legal Institute. According to an archive of its website, The FME Law Clinic was originally incorporated as the George Mason Environmental Law Clinic until “the Directors of FME Law engaged in a friendly and supportive discussion with the Dean of the George Mason University School of Law and recognized that the clinic could better perform its function by servicing multiple law schools as a stand-alone clinic. The Board thus directed a name change to reflect this broadened purpose. Until completion of the legal transition to its new name, the Clinic is doing business as the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic but must retain its original name for banking and tax purposes.” [1]
Notably,George Mason University as received more in funding from the Koch Brothers than any other academic institution, with the GMU and GMU Foundation alone having received over $70 million from Koch-connected foundations since 1986. Charles Koch sits on the board of directors of the Mercatus Center. [3]
In 2018, FMELC became involved in a dispute with its leadership, with claims on one side of extortion, lying to the IRS in order to obtain its tax-exempt status, and other accusations. The primary dispute is between David Schnare, who faces allegations of misrepresenting the group to obtain tax-exempt status, and coal-industry lawyer Chris Horner. Horner and Schnare had conceived FME Law, then George Mason Environmental Law Clinic, in 2011. [4], [5]
The FMELC has repeatedly sent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requeststargeting climate scientists including Michael Mann and James Hansen. They have also filed lawsuits fighting against Colorado's Renewable Energy Standard, and against the EPA's efforts to impose water quality standards in Virginia. [6]
==
https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/04/24/pruitt-s-transparency-rule-would-use-big-tobacco-plan-gut-epa-science-protecting-public
secert ssci bs:
:On April 24, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt released a proposed rule that would restrict which scientific studies EPA could use in creating new regulations. The move — already controversial when it was first revealed over a month ago — would prevent EPA from considering studies in which the data is not available to the public, including the private health information of individuals in medical studies, and which is based on one-time events, such as the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Prominent climate science deniers were in attendance at the EPA announcement, including Marc Morano, Steve Milloy, and Will Happer.
...
March 16, E&E reported that EPA Admin Scott Pruitt is brewing more plans to further hobble how the EPA uses (or in this case, doesn’t use) science to protect the public. According to E&E, the effort will be similar to the Orwellian-esque HONEST Act that Lamar Smith sponsored a year ago but is stalled in the Senate. Pruitt’s idea is to apply a blanket set of new criteria to studies the EPA can cite. The “sound science” recommendations are designed to sound reasonable, but in practice would render lots of high quality, relevant research off-limits.
Sharon Lerner at The Intercept wrote last summer that that this “sound science” concept — demanding all science used to inform regulations be made publicly accessible — comes straight from a 1996 memo from lobbyist/lawyer Chris Horner to tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds. Horner advised the tobacco company that because the EPA was probably going to be looking further into the health impacts of smoking, the agency should “construct explicit procedural hurdles [it] must follow in issuing scientific reports.”
Horner’s memo gives specific attention to the fact that these efforts should target “extra-judicial” documents, meaning those that can’t be ruled on by the courts. In particular, the 1996 memo referenced the agency’s Science Advisory Board reviews, underpin regulations but aren’t legally bound by the Administrative Procedures Act. He suggested the tobacco industry should be “initiating reforms by playing a strong role in molding and guiding Congress’s oversight of EPA’s latest Clean Air Act initiative (on PM 2.5/ozone.)”
Lerner explains that along with Chris Horner (whose career has gone from strategizing for tobacco to evade regulation to working on behalf of coal companies to harass climate scientists), another major advocate of this push to identify “extra-judicial” approaches is Steve Milloy. Like Horner, Milloy has worked on behalf of both coal and tobacco and is now affiliated with the Energy and Environment Legal Institute.
Milloy was present at Heritage for Pruitt’s announcement earlier this week, per E&E, and told them this will happen “sooner rather than later.” Remember that Milloy successfully pushed to have PM2.5-skeptical industry-friendly researchers installed on the Science Advisory Boards.
Pruitt’s scheme — which is, of course, strongly opposed by scientists and scientific organizations — appears to be twenty years in the making. The '90s really are back: Pruitt stands ready to turn Big Tobacco’s 1996 dream into yet another one of 2018’s nightmares.
While Pruitt’s financial connections to the fossil fuel industry have been well-reported, there doesn’t seem to be any clear ties between him and his organizations to big tobacco. But we did find that as Oklahoma Attorney General, Pruitt decided not to join a bipartisan group of AGs calling for retailers to stop selling tobacco products.
There’s really no telling if the industry is giving money to Pruitt-affiliated groups like the fossil fuel industry has.
But where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and be it from a cigarette or a coal plant, it’s not good for public health.
==
==
The top-billed witness scheduled to provide testimony at the House hearing on Tuesday is a lawyer named Jeffrey Holmstead, who has has worked to block the EPA’s efforts to limit mercury pollution while representing coal companies including Duke Energy, Progress Energy, and Southern Company. Meanwhile,Lamar Smith, the Texas Republican chair of the House Science Committee who has been zealously promoting the“secret science” bill, is also in the pocket of the energy companies. Though he’s also received funding from Koch Industries and iHeartMedia (formerly Clear Channel Communications), Smith’s biggest contributors are oil and gas companies, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Also testifying on Tuesday will be Kimberly White of the American Chemistry Council, the chemical industry trade group.
This bald industry bid to subvert public health-based regulations that can cut into profit isn’t new. What’s new is that this upside-down environmental attack, in which those who benefit directly from polluting industries are policing the independent scientists who can show the harms of their products, could now succeed. Although the House passed the secret science bill in 2014 and 2015, it never made it to the Senate floor. After it passed the House in 2015, Barbara Boxer called the bill “insane,” Bernie Sanders called it “laughable,” and President Obama promised to veto it. This time, it’s not a joke. With a Republican majority in both houses and Trump in the White House, the secret science act could easily become law
The small group of lawyers and PR strategists orchestrating the secret science effort are closely tied to those attacking the EPA from within. All have connections to either big tobacco, oil, or both — and almost all have been affiliated with a small, right-wing group called the **Energy & Environment Legal Institute**. It’s interesting that E&E should fixate on transparency since the group has gone to great lengths to conceal its donors. Nevertheless, public records document some of the group’s ties to big coal companies, including the now bankrupt Alpha Natural Resources, Peabody Coal, and Arch Coal.
E&E senior policy fellow Steve Milloy, a former tobacco industry attorney, has perhaps written the most — at least publicly — about the secret science strategy, both in an ebook and for Steve Bannon’s Breitbart News. Milloy calls Myron Ebell, who oversaw Trump’s EPA transition team, his “friend and hero.” In the late 1990s, Milloy and Ebell were both members of the American Petroleum Institute’s Global Climate Science Communications Team, which laid out the oil industry’s strategy to undermine the science of global warming. Meanwhile, three of Milloy’s colleagues from E&E are also members of the EPA landing team. Among them are David Schnare, E&E’s general counsel, who is perhaps best known for harassing Michael Mann and other environmental scientists with FOIA requests, and Amy Oliver Cooke, an energy industry think tanker who created MILF,
[vid]:amy Oliver Cooke describes her love for fracking.
Two other E&E associates have been wrapped up in the secret science strategy for years. The first is Christopher Horner,a senior fellow at both E&E and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who is also a member of Trump’s EPA landing team.Back in the 1990s, Horner worked for Bracewell LLP, the law firm (formerly known as Bracewell & Giuliani) supplying the top witness at Tuesday’s hearing. The dawning awareness of the dangers of second-hand smoke was putting tobacco companies on the defensive, including Horner’s client, the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. In a 1996 memo, which seems to be the earliest known reference to the secret science strategy, Horner laid out a plan to fight back.
==
May 8, 2017
- ISSUE ANALYSIS
The Legal and Economic Case Against the Paris Climate Treaty
Christopher C. Horner, Marlo Lewis, Jr.
May 3, 2017
- REGULATORY COMMENTS AND TESTIMONY
Options for Addressing President Trump's Paris Climate Pact Promise
Christopher C. Horner, Marlo Lewis, Jr.
April 25, 2017
==
MANY OF THE LEADING scientists working on climate change research around the country have found themselves targeted by David Schnare, an attorney working for a coal-industry-backed nonprofit. In recent years, Schnare has hounded academics with lawsuits and voluminous record requests as part of a campaign the Union of Concerned Scientists has called “harassment” designed to “chill their speech, and discourage them from tackling contentious topics.”
Now, Schnare is working for Donald Trump.
On Monday, the Trump transition team named Schnare to the team revamping the Environmental Protection Agency, the agency that oversees climate change and pollution-related research and science. Schnare is one of many operatives with fossil-fuel ties to join Trump’s EPA team, but his name stands out as someone who has gone beyond mere advocacy by actively working to intimidate individual scientists.
Schnare, the general counsel for the Environment & Energy Legal Institute, a group formerly known as the American Tradition Institute, has gone after climate scientists for the last five years.
Dr. James Hansen, a former NASA scientist whose 1988 congressional testimony brought national attention to the dangers of climate change — and who in 2006 revealed that the Bush administration was censoring climate change research — was among the first targets. In 2011, Schnare filed a lawsuit demanding years of Hansen’s records, and in the accompanying press release, claimed that Hansen was engaged in “‘global warming’ activism” as a ploy to enrich himself.
That year Schnare also joined the legal battle against former University of Virginia climate scientist Michael Mann, filing a request for Mann’s personal emails and other correspondence, and suing UVA to force disclosure. Mann, an award-winning scientists whose research has shown earth’s temperature rise, had long been a target of the fossil fuel industry, had faced death threats for his work on climate change.
Schnare lost the Mann lawsuit; a Virginia court ordered his group to pay Mann $250 in damages.
Schnare and his organization have filed similar requests against University of Arizona scientists Jonathan Overpeck and Malcolm Hughes, NASA scientist Gavin Schmidt, and Katharine Hayhoe, a scientist at Texas Tech University.
Gretchen Goldman, the research director of the Union of Concerned Scientists, says that Schnare’s “E&E Legal does the dirty work that fossil fuel companies don’t want to associate themselves with, including harassing and attacking scientists.”
Goldman also noted that a former fellow with Schnare’s organization worked to help pass legislation in North Carolina to ban state agencies from using scientific research showing sea-level rise.
“They literally tried to outlaw sea level rise,” says Goldman. “What kind of scientific analysis do you think they are going to try to ban at the EPA?”
Last year, The Intercept was the first to report that Schnare’s colleague, Christopher Horner, had received funding through a sister organization from Alpha Natural Resources, a major coal mining company. A subsequent filing revealed that Peabody Coal, the largest private sector coal firm in the world, has directly supported Schnare’s E&E Legal.
https://theintercept.com/2016/12/09/david-schnare-trump/
==
aug 2015 fang
Christopher Horner, an attorney who claims that the earth is cooling, is known within the scientific community for hounding climate change researchers with relentless investigations and public ridicule, often deriding scientists as “communists” and frauds.
Horner is a regular guest on Fox News and CNN, and has been affiliated with a number of think tanks and legal organizations over the last decade. He has called for investigations of climate scientists affiliated with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and NASA, and inundated climate researchers at major universities across the country with records requests that critics say are designed to distract them from their work.
New court documents reveal one source of Horner’s funding: big coal.
Last Thursday’s bankruptcy filing of Alpha Natural Resources, one of the largest coal companies in America, includes line items for all of the corporation’s contractors and grant recipients. Among them are Horner individually at his home address, as well as the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, where he is a senior staff attorney.
Reached by phone today about his relationship with Alpha Natural Resources, Horner said he would get back with us.David W. Schnare, director of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic,subsequently emailed a response neither confirming nor denying that Horner or his organizations have received funding from the coal giant. Schnare said that “nearly all” his organization’s donors “request that we not disclose their names” and noted that under IRS regulations it is not required to do so.Schnare also stated that “the sources of our funding have no role in which cases” his organization prosecutes.
The Alpha Natural Resources filing corroborates the suggestion in a recent email from chief executives of major coal firms that they are underwriting Horner’s current work.
In early June this year, the Coal & Investment Leadership Forum, a trade show, sent this message to its email list: “As the ‘war on coal’ continues, I trust that the commitment we have made to support Chris Horner’s work will eventually create great awareness of the illegal tactics being employed to pass laws that are intended to destroy our industry.” The email was signed by Alliance Resource Partners’ Joe Craft III, Alpha Natural Resources’ Kevin Crutchfield, Drummond Company’s Gary Drummond, Arch Coal’s John Eaves and United Coal Co.’s Jim McGlothlin.
Horner has played a prominent role in the climate science debate for many years, though he has failed to uncover wrongdoing.
In 2009, thousands of emails were hacked from climate researchers at the University of East Anglia. Horner quickly blogged that the “blue-dress moment may have arrived” and began appearing on media outlets to claim that the emails revealed “admissions of falsifying results, collaborating to subvert and violate the laws” in what he dubbed “Climategate.”
“Climategate” became a media phenomenon, with prominent politicians declaring that the emails revealed that climate change is a “hoax.” The Koch organization Americans for Prosperity traveled to international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in 2009 and proclaimed that the emails revealed a “scandal.”
Six official investigations later cleared the University of East Anglia scientists of accusations of any wrongdoing.
Horner has filed numerous records requests for personal emails from climate scientists and litigated to force universities to comply with his requests. Horner continued his investigations of climate scientists earlier this year by filing a records request with John Byrne, distinguished professor of energy climate policy at the University of Delaware. The request was made on behalf of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic and the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, where Horner is a senior fellow.
“He has been instrumental in orchestrating the attacks on climate scientists over the past decade in the form of vexatious and frivolous FOIA demands, efforts to force scientists to turn over all of their personal email,” says Dr. Michael Mann, a climate scientist targeted by Horner.
Horner has also often cast scientists as villains. He claimed on Alex Jones’ program “Infowars” that climate science is a backdoor strategy for enacting “global governance.” On Fox News, Horner mysteriously claimed that White House science adviser John Holdren is “if not borderline communist — communist.”
In an interview with The Intercept, Dr. Gretchen T. Goldman of the Union of Concerned Scientists said it is “reprehensible” to learn that coal companies are “funding the harassment of scientists.”
==
9/15
In August, The Intercept revealed that Alpha Natural Resources, one of the largest coal mining companies in America, has been secretly financing think tanks and political organizations that deny climate change. One of the people they funded, attorney Chris Horner, is well known for hounding climate scientists across the country.
The payments were exposed in the firm’s bankruptcy filings last month.
On Monday, when I asked Kevin Crutchfield, the chief executive officer of Alpha Natural Resources, about his company’s support for Horner and his aggressive investigations of climate scientists, he was unapologetic.
“It should come as no surprise to you that we support those with like-minded philosophies,” Crutchfield said.
We spoke briefly at the Southern States Energy Board, an energy conferenced hosted at The Greenbrier resort in West Virginia.
“Everything we have to disclose, it’s on our restructuring website,” Crutchfield added, referring to the website that helps manage Alpha Natural Resource’s bankruptcy proceedings. He added, “The other thing I’d like to say is that the amount of political contributions pale in the amount of charitable contributions we’ve made over the years.”
As we reported, Alpha Natural Resources has funded a wide array of political groups that have helped the coal industry beat back environmental regulations, including the American Enterprise Institute, the American Legislative Exchange Council, the Heartland Institute, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The filings also showed that the firm helped finance the Kentucky Opportunity Coalition, a dark money group that was set up to provide undisclosed campaign support to the reelection effort of Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., in his race last year.
The bankruptcy filings named recipients of Alpha Natural Resources’ money, but did not provide dollar amounts for the contributions. I asked Crutchfield how much he has given to Horner and other groups that work to deny the existence of manmade climate change.
“I don’t know the numbers. We believe in transparency,” he retorted, and began walking away.
I asked if he believes that the burning of fossil fuels contributes to climate change. “It doesn’t matter what I believe because the bus has left the station seems like,” Crutchfield said, smiling. By then, a group of men with earpieces surrounded the Alpha Natural Resources CEO, blocking me from asking any more questions.
==
BOOKS
Horner: author of three best-selling books: Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America (Regnery, 2010); Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed (Regnery, 2008) and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism (Regnery, 2007), which spent half of 2007 on the New York Times bestseller list.]
The Liberal War on Transparency (2012) Threshold
"Praise for" Power Grab
""Power Grab" exposes the agenda of the Obama administration and its allies, from 'green jobs' to the cap-and-trade energy tax as ways to cram down the Left's long-held wish list of demands, and dream of 'organizing society.' Horner reveals what their rhetoric means, how the schemes work and what it all spells for you if they win. Power Grab lays bare the plan to replace your individual liberties with the state, securing the Left's dream of making decisions for you and your family: what you can drive, how you can live, and what sorts of jobs and future they deem acceptable for Americans."
--Mark Levin, bestselling author and nationally syndicated radio host
"Chris Horner raises the red flag about the so-called 'green economy.' "Power Grab" shows the dark gray economic fallacies that lie behind the bright 'green' economic fairy tales, in a way everyone can understand, if while laughing between the tears."
--Dr. Gabriel Calzada, professor of applied environmental economics at King Juan Carlos University
""Power Grab" exposes the incestuous relationships between the Obama administration and the piles of taxpayer money it wants to pipeline to the Big Green juggernaut consisting of Big Business and Big Labor. Horner shows that the green agenda isn't so much about a clean environment as it is about redistributing income from us to them."
--Stephen Moore, member of "The Wall Street Journal" editorial board and senior economics writer
"Chris Horner was right in his bestselling "The Politically Incorrect Guide(TM) to Global Warming and Environmentalism." He was right in his book "Red Hot Lies" that exposed the cover-ups, lies, and intimidation of the global-warming alarmists. And he's right again in his new book "Power Grab," which exposes what the extremists are really after: power over you, your wallet, and even your right to self-government. "Power Grab" is essential reading for fighting back."
--Congresswoman Michele Bachmann
From the Inside Flap
LIBERALS ARE HIDING THE TRUTH FROM YOU. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT, AMERICA?
Hailed by Glenn Beck as a "watchdog" and by Rush Limbaugh as a "go-to guy," bestselling author and attorney Christopher C. Horner is a leader in the fight against liberal tyranny in America with his requests for information even declared "criminal" by the Obama administration. Revealing explosive new information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and well-placed sources, Horner exposes the tightly kept secret of liberals running our government and schools: a carefully managed war to undermine the taxpayers' right to see what their government is up to.
==
https://theintercept.com/2015/08/25/chris-horner-coal/
fang 2x?
Attorney Hounding Climate Scientists Is Covertly Funded By Coal Industry
Christopher Horner, an attorney who claims that the earth is cooling, is known within the scientific community for hounding climate change researchers with relentless investigations and public ridicule, often deriding scientists as “communists” and frauds.
Horner is a regular guest on Fox News and CNN, and has been affiliated with a number of think tanks and legal organizations over the last decade. He has called for investigations of climate scientists affiliated with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and NASA, and inundated climate researchers at major universities across the country with records requests that critics say are designed to distract them from their work.
New court documents reveal one source of Horner’s funding: big coal.
Last Thursday’s bankruptcy filing of Alpha Natural Resources, one of the largest coal companies in America, includes line items for all of the corporation’s contractors and grant recipients. Among them are Horner individually at his home address, as well as the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, where he is a senior staff attorney.
Reached by phone today about his relationship with Alpha Natural Resources, Horner said he would get back with us. David W. Schnare, director of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, subsequently emailed a response neither confirming nor denying that Horner or his organizations have received funding from the coal giant. Schnare said that “nearly all” his organization’s donors “request that we not disclose their names” and noted that under IRS regulations it is not required to do so. Schnare also stated that “the sources of our funding have no role in which cases” his organization prosecutes.
The Alpha Natural Resources filing corroborates the suggestion in a recent email from chief executives of major coal firms that they are underwriting Horner’s current work.
In early June this year, the Coal & Investment Leadership Forum, a trade show, sent this message to its email list: “As the ‘war on coal’ continues, I trust that the commitment we have made to support Chris Horner’s work will eventually create great awareness of the illegal tactics being employed to pass laws that are intended to destroy our industry.” The email was signed by Alliance Resource Partners’ Joe Craft III, Alpha Natural Resources’ Kevin Crutchfield, Drummond Company’s Gary Drummond, Arch Coal’s John Eaves and United Coal Co.’s Jim McGlothlin.
Horner has played a prominent role in the climate science debate for many years, though he has failed to uncover wrongdoing.
In 2009, thousands of emails were hacked from climate researchers at the University of East Anglia. Horner quickly blogged that the “blue-dress moment may have arrived” and began appearing on media outlets to claim that the emails revealed “admissions of falsifying results, collaborating to subvert and violate the laws” in what he dubbed “Climategate.”
“Climategate” became a media phenomenon, with prominent politicians declaring that the emails revealed that climate change is a “hoax.” The Koch organization Americans for Prosperity traveled to international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in 2009 and proclaimed that the emails revealed a “scandal.”
Six official investigations later cleared the University of East Anglia scientists of accusations of any wrongdoing.
Horner has filed numerous records requests for personal emails from climate scientists and litigated to force universities to comply with his requests. Horner continued his investigations of climate scientists earlier this year by filing a records request with John Byrne, distinguished professor of energy climate policy at the University of Delaware. The request was made on behalf of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic and the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, where Horner is a senior fellow.
“He has been instrumental in orchestrating the attacks on climate scientists over the past decade in the form of vexatious and frivolous FOIA demands, efforts to force scientists to turn over all of their personal email,” says Dr. Michael Mann, a climate scientist targeted by Horner.
Horner has also often cast scientists as villains. He claimed on Alex Jones’ program “Infowars” that climate science is a backdoor strategy for enacting “global governance.” On Fox News, Horner mysteriously claimed that White House science adviser John Holdren is “if not borderline communist — communist.”
In an interview with The Intercept, Dr. Gretchen T. Goldman of the Union of Concerned Scientists said it is “reprehensible” to learn that coal companies are “funding the harassment of scientists.”
==
6/16
This month, an Arizona court ruled that over a decade of two climate scientists’ emails must be turned over to E&E Legal, a :{coal:(style="-webkit-padding-start:0px;font-weight:700"):}:-:{funded:(style="-webkit-padding-start:0px;font-weight:700"):}: group that openly works to discredit climate science. This is an incredibly dangerous court decision that will force climate scientists to work within a fishbowl, where every email exchange can be picked apart by agenda-driven opponents – inhibiting scientific debate, discouraging collaboration, and chilling academic thought. :{ E&E Legal wants these outcomes and, in fact, the group openly acknowledges it seeks emails that, in their words, “embarrass” climate scientists and their institutions. E&E Legal (previously named the American Tradition Institute) has a long history of attacking scientists by “filing nuisance suits to disrupt important academic research.” The trial court originally ruled in March 2015 to protect the scientists’ emails, but this month’s new decision completely reverses the earlier ruling. Thankfully, this new decision can – and should – be appealed, and we are currently strategizing the best way to do so. }: |
==
ref'd
bankruptcy watch wsj
http://blogs.wsj.com/bankruptcy/2016/03/11/arch-coal-made-10000-gift-to-energy-environment-legal/
Arch Coal Inc., the nation’s second biggest coal miner, donated $10,000 to a Washington D.C.-based legal group known for filing lawsuits against climate scientists.
Arch, which filed for chapter 11 protection in January, made the gift in 2014 to the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, a nonprofit formerly known as the American Tradition Institute, according to recently filed bankruptcy court papers. The connection between Arch and E&E Legal was reported last month by the watchdog group, the Center for Media and Democracy.
But until the recent bankruptcy filing, it wasn’t clear how much Arch had donated to E&E Legal,known for using Freedom of Information Act laws to unearth emails among climate scientists, environmentalists and regulators.
In perhaps its most famous case to date, E&E Legal sued the University of Virginia to access the emails of meteorologist Michael Mann, the author of a famous”hockey stick” study that showed global temperatures have risen in conjunction with our use of fossil fuels. Virginia’s Supreme Court ultimately sided with the school in 2014.
Craig Richardson, E&E Legal’s executive director, said that Arch’s 2014 donation “was for general support” and amounted to less than 4% of that year’s contributions to the nonprofit. Apart from the donation, “we have no relationship with Arch Coal,” he told Bankruptcy Beat.
Arch spokeswoman Logan Bonacorsi said the the company has provided “millions of dollars of funding in recent years” to a range of organizations focused on addressing climate concerns by advancing low-carbon coal technologies.
“We believe strongly that technology rather than excessive, premature and costly regulation is the solution to achieving a low-carbon future,” Ms. Bonacorsi said.
This isn’t the first instance of a bankrupt coal company disclosing payments to a climate change skeptic. In October, The Wall Street Journal reported coal company Alpha Natural Resources paid lawyer Chris Horner $18,600 before it filed for chapter 11 this summer. The payment followed an Intercept article by Lee Fang on how the coal industry was funding think tanks that deny climate change.
Mr. Horner, senior legal fellow at E&E Legal and author of books like“Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed,” is one of the industry’s most visible defenders, the “longtime go-to guy on global warming extremism,” according to Rush Limbaugh.
Reached Friday, Mr. Horner said: “I am unawareof any relationship the company has or doesn’t have with E&E Legal.” When asked whether Arch supported his work, he said: “the records likely show Arch Coal is not a legal client of mine.” WEASEL
Write to Patrick Fitzgerald at patrick.fitzgerald@**wsj.**com.
==
Climate Science Legal Defense Fund (CSLDF)
==
Daily Caller: Experts: New Bill Could Stop Executive Overreach
8
JUN
DAILY CALLER: EXPERTS: NEW BILL COULD STOP EXECUTIVE OVERREACH
posted under: Conflict of Interest, Horner, Media Coverage
by Kevin Daley The Daily Caller
A House panel approved legislation Wednesday that ends a judicial doctrine the Obama administration regularly relies upon when promulgating new rules and regulations. The Separation of Powers Restoration Act (SOPRA) repeals the Chevron doctrine, which requires that courts defer to a federal agency’s interpretation
http://dailycaller.com/2016/06/08/experts-new-bill-could-stop-executive-overreach/#ixzz4B7VbmWuN
House panel approved legislation Wednesday that ends a judicial doctrine the Obama administration regularly relies upon when promulgating new rules and regulations.
The Separation of Powers Restoration Act (SOPRA) repeals the Chevron doctrine, which requires that courts defer to a federal agency’s interpretation of the law unless their interpretation is “unreasonable.” Instead, the bill provides that a court should conduct a review of “all relevant questions of law, including the interpretation of constitutional and statutory provisions and rules” when evaluating federal rules and regulations.
Elizabeth Slattery, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, welcomes the development.
“This [SOPRA] would really bring back a layer of oversight because that really is something the court should be providing,” Slattery told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “When a rule is injuring a citizen and they’re able to come into court and challenge it, they should get real, meaningful judicial review and not this sort of ‘Well, the agencies interpretation is good enough for government work.'”
:{
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2016/06/08/experts-new-bill-could-stop-executive-overreach/#ixzz4BrxldgYY}:
--
https://projects.propublica.org/represent/bills/114/hr4768
| read the bill | read the bill |
|---|---|
| Sponsor | John Ratcliffe, R-Texas |
| Total Cosponsors | 113 (All Republicans) |
==
CEI!
http://insideclimatenews.org/news/08042016/think-tank-fossil-fuel-ties-competitive-enterprise-institute-subpoena-attorney-general-climate-change-exxon
Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative Washington, D.C., think tank and one of the fossil fuel industry's most steadfast allies, disclosed on Thursday thatthe attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islandsis demanding to see records of the group's donors and activities involving climate policy.
The subpoena represents a broadening of a multifaceted legal inquiry into whether fossil fuel companies broke any laws as they sought for decades to undermine the scientific consensus and head off forceful action to address the climate crisis.
For the first time, the investigation now appears to touch on the actions of third parties supported by the industry—and perhaps into their joint lobbying actions.
CEI said it "will vigorously fight to quash this subpoena."
The island territory is just one of several jurisdictions now looking into the actions of ExxonMobil Corporation and other fossil fuel companies. The investigations, first announced by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, are thought to be in their early stages, and the investigators have offered few details of their scope.
Attorney General Claude Walker of the Virgin Islands/Credit: ICN
Turning the spotlight on CEI is an assertive tactic from a surprising quarter. The Virgin Islands, while it may not have the legal muscle of New York with its powerful securities and consumer laws, is especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
CEI said the subpoena from Attorney General Claude E. Walker "attempts to unearth a decade of the organization's materials and work on climate change policy."
"The subpoena requests a decade's worth of communications, emails, statements, drafts, and other documents regarding CEI's work on climate change and energy policy, including private donor information," the institute said. "It demands that CEI produce these materials from 20 years ago, from 1997-2007, by April 30, 2016."
"This is the latest effort in an intimidation campaign to criminalize speech and research on the climate debate, led by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and former Vice President Al Gore," the institute said.
Schneiderman's subpoena of Exxon last year sparked an expanding inquiry by several Democratic attorneys general. A group of them held a press conference along with Gore last week to describe their coordinated actions on climate change, including the inquiries as well as support for the Obama administration's climate agenda. The attorneys general of Massachusetts and California are also investigating Exxon or other fossil fuel interests.
The investigations began after InsideClimate News, and later the Los Angeles Times, as well as other journalists reported on the history of Exxon's emerging understanding of climate change science in the 1970s and its subsequent efforts to undermine the scientific consensus, in part by financing research organizations including CEI.
CEI's general counsel, Sam Kazman, said it was "an affront to our First Amendment rights of free speech and association for Attorney General Walker to bring such intimidating demands against a nonprofit group. If Walker and his allies succeed, the real victims will be all Americans, whose access to affordable energy will be hit by one costly regulation after another, while scientific and policy debates are wiped out one subpoena at a time."
The inquiry's timeframe covers a crucial period beginning in 2000 and 2001, at the start of the Bush-Cheney administration, when lobbyists from ExxonMobil and other fossil fuel companies were pressing the new administration to reverse Clinton-Gore policies on global warming, reject the Kyoto Protocol and overhaul government research programs into climate change.
CEI was deeply involved in this campaign, according to multiple sources, including a detailed expose by a whistleblower named Rick Piltz.
For example, CEI filed a lawsuit against both the outgoing Clinton and the incoming Bush administrations, aimed at preventing a significant review of climate science, the 2000 National Climate Assessment, from forming the basis of federal policies and international negotiations. The lawsuit was dismissed, but the CEI had made its point with the Bush administration, which continued to resist the scientific consensus endorsed by the previous administration.
At the time the Bush administration was rewriting federal climate studies, a task carried out by a former oil company lobbyist who moved into the Council on Environmental Quality under Bush, and then went to work for Exxon when his role was publicly disclosed.
Much of the White House's engagement with the energy lobby during the early Bush-Cheney years still remains undisclosed. The administration refused to publish all its communications with the industry during its first year in office, when Vice President Dick Cheney ran an energy policy task force that consulted heavily with the industry behind closed doors.
The Virgin Islands subpoena suggests one way that some new details might be brought to light.
CEI is one of several organizations that have been repeatedly named over the years by those who have criticized Exxon and other fossil fuel companies for financing the climate denial work of third parties. After the Royal Society of the United Kingdom castigated Exxon in 2006 for giving money to groups misrepresenting climate science, Exxon said it had stopped financing the CEI.
In his remarks at last week's press conference, Walker said the fossil fuel investigation "is not an environmental issue as much as it is about survival. We try as attorneys general to build a safe community for all. But what good is that if, annually, everything is destroyed.
"It could be David versus Goliath—the Virgin Islands against a huge corporation," he said. "But we will not stop until we get to the bottom of this and make it clear to our residents as well as the American people that we have to do something transformational."
==
==
http://www.prwatch.org/news/2016/03/13062/chris-horner-revealed-counsel-coal-company-alpha-natural-resources
nick s
Chris Horner, a DC-based lawyer, climate change denier and Fox News regular, is also being paid as a "Regulatory Counsel" for the coal company, Alpha Natural Resources,according to bankruptcy filings reviewed by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD). Horner’s repeated filing of lawsuits against leading U.S. climate scientists has been described as "harassment."
Alpha funding for Horner was first reported by Lee Fang, writing for the Intercept in August 2015 from earlier bankruptcy filings, although his role as Counsel was unknown until now.
Horner's role as Regulatory Counsel for Alpha is described in a declaration that he signed, and which was filed with the bankruptcy court on January 11, 2016. Another document shows that funding from Alpha to Horner has continued through to at least the end of January, 2016, which is the most recent reporting period.
As the Wall Street Journal has reported, Horner was paid a total of $18,600 by Alpha for the months of May, June and July 2015. More recent filings reviewed by CMD show that he has subsequently been paid at least $12,000 more since then, taking the total amount to at least $30,600 for the nine month period between May 2015 and Jan 2016.
With the U.S. coal industry increasingly collapsing, coal company bankruptcy filings are now revealing what has long been suspected but not proven: that leading climate change deniers and many of the biggest defenders of coal, are funded by the industry that they are working to protect.
Coal Industry Funding of Climate Denial
CMD recently revealed that another coal company filing for bankruptcy, Arch Coal, has provided funding to the Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal), where Chris Horner is also a Senior Legal Fellow. Both Arch and Alpha also fund the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), another climate change denial group, in which Horner has participated for many years. ALEC has been instrumental in trying to block action to implement the Obama-administration's Clean Power Plan at the state level. The Clean Power Plan is currently on hold, pending review by the Court of Appeals.
Through E&E Legal, Horner has filed countless public record requests with climate scientists working at state universities and other public bodies--requests that typically demand unpublished research and personal emails. When the scientists don't hand over everything, lawsuits are filed and years of litigation begins, distracting from actual climate research.
In his bio, Horner doesn't mention Alpha or any other coal company, although he does list the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), "scientists," and members of the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate as all being past or current clients.
In addition to his role working for Alpha, whatever it is he does in that role, Chris Horner is an illustrative example of how the coal industry has spread funding to myriad groups, giving the impression of a broad cast of characters for its climate denial performance. In reality its a relatively small group of actors performing all the roles.
This is what is known to date about Horner's work with groups funded by the coal industry:
Chris Horner's Coal Ties:
- Regulatory Counsel for Alpha Natural Resources
- Senior Legal Fellow at Energy & Environment Legal Institute, which is funded by Arch Coal.
- Senior Clinical Attorney for theFree Market Environment Law Clinic from which he received $110,000 in 2014, and which is funded by Alpha Natural Resources.
- A Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which in 2009 funding from $90k Murray Energy and $100k from Massey Energy.
- Participant in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force, funded by a host of coal companies, including Peabody Energy, Arch Coal, Alpha Natural Resources
- An "expert" for the Heartland Institute, which is funded by Alpha Natural Resources.
As CMD has previously reported, Horner was a speaker at a 2015 private and highly secretive annual coal summit, organized by five coal companies, including Arch Coal and Alpha Natural Resources, as well as Alliance Resource Partners, Drummond Company, and United Coal Company.
CMD was provided with a copy of an email sent to attendees after the event.
The note, signed by the CEOs of all five coal companies, suggests each of them may be funding Horner. It said: "As the 'war on coal' continues, I trust that the commitment we have made to support Chris Horner's work will eventually create great awareness of the illegal tactics being employed to pass laws that are intended to destroy our industry."
Peabody Energy, described as the largest coal company in the world, is the next coal giant facing bankruptcy. The price of Peabody stock has dropped 97% over the past year and it recently warned its investors that it may seek bankruptcy protections from creditors.
The company had recently reached a settlement with the New York Attorney General, over allegations that it had misled its investors about the risk climate change posed to its longterm business. But that investigation was about the rights of shareholders and the price of their shares, not directly about Peabody's role in funding climate change denial. If the company does file for bankruptcy then much more may soon be revealed about coal funding for climate change denial and opposition to tackling climate change.
- See more at: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2016/03/13062/chris-horner-revealed-counsel-coal-company-alpha-natural-resources#sthash.yNJ0Y9aF.dpuf
==
'Data Quality' Law Is Nemesis Of Regulation
"It's a tool to clobber every effort to regulate," said Rena Steinzor, a professor of law and director of the Environmental Law Clinic at the University of Maryland. "In my view, it amounts to censorship and harassment."
That's a view that Christopher C. Hornerof the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute -- which has used the act repeatedly to challenge scientific information -- brushed off as "whiny."
--
"Hey, you're making me be accurate," he mocked. "I have no sympathy for that."
Horner said the act, if anything, has proved less useful than anticipated to groups such as his that seek to minimize government regulation. And figures from the OMB confirm that agencies have in many cases resisted challenges to their scientific findings.
Of the 39 Data Quality Act petitions in The Post's analysis, five have resulted in at least some of the changes sought -- all of them filed by industry interests. Five were denied, five were diverted by the agencies to other bureaucratic avenues, and
Yet there are signs, Graham acknowledged, that
Studying Atrazine
Climate Scientist Faces Backlash for Urging Investigation of Fossil Fuel Companies
Jagadish Shukla will be questioned by a Congressional committee after he and other scientists called for a racketeering probe of deliberate climate denial.
climate scientist who was the lead signatory on a letter urging President Obama to launch a federal investigation into whether fossil fuel companies "knowingly deceived the American people about the risks of climate change" is now facing an investigation by Congress because of his part in the letter.
Jagadish Shukla, a climate scientist at George Mason University in Virginia, received notice Oct. 1 that the non-profit research organization he runs, the Institute of Global Environment and Society (IGES), will soon be investigated by the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology for suspected misuse of federal funding.
Republican Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, who chairs the House committee, requested that Shukla and IGES "preserve all e-mail, electronic documents, and data (‘electronic records’) created since January 1, 2009," according to the notice.
The investigation stems from Shukla's involvement in the letter to President Obama, Attorney General Loretta Lynch and White House science advisor John Holdren on Sept. 1. The letter's 20 signees—climate scientists from Columbia University, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, the University of Maryland and other institutions—asked the administration to explore whether energy companies could be prosecuted under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) of 1970 for purposefully casting doubt on the scientific evidence for climate change. Federal prosecutors used the RICO Act in the 1990s and 2000s to sue tobacco companies for covering up the health impacts of smoking. ScienceInsider first reported Smith's investigation.
Shukla's research organization, IGES, posted a copy of the RICO letter to its website—a move that Smith told Shukla "raises serious concerns" over a taxpayer-funded scientific group "participating in partisan political activity." The research center has received funds from the National Science Foundation, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.
"Promoting a lobbying effort and publicizing that effort on a website is not an appropriate use of federal research funds," an aide for the House Science, Space and Technology Committee told InsideClimate News.
"Additional questions have been raised regarding the fiscal management of federal grant dollars received by IGES and the transfer of IGES to George Mason University," the aide said. The committee will be looking into the salaries of Shukla and his wife Anastasia, who works as the organization's business manager.
"I signed this letter as a private citizen on personal time, urging action on climate change, and I have been shocked by the reaction," Shukla told InsideClimate News. "Any allegations of inappropriate behavior are untrue."
IGES said the letter was posted on its website inadvertently. It has since been removed.
"IGES's recent decision to remove documents from its website raises concerns that additional information vital to the Committee's investigation may not be preserved," Smith wrote. Smith informed Shukla he and his colleagues had until Oct. 8 to inform the House Committee on how IGES would comply with the request.
"The House Science Committee isn’t going after Dr. Shukla and his colleagues for their scientific work, but for their opinions as private citizens," said Michael Halpern, program manager of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists. "Scientists have the same right as anyone to engage in the political process and express their beliefs without fear of being hauled before Congress for their views."
A History of Inquiries
Smith's investigation is just the latest in a long line of probes into climate scientists by conservative politicians. In 2005, Republican Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, who was then Chair of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, examined the work of climate scientists Michael Mann of Penn State and Ray Bradley of the University of Massachusetts. Over the last decade, the scientific community has had to field an increasing number of public records requests from conservative groups looking to cast doubt on their research.
"Overall, scientists whose work is policy relevant are certainly under more scrutiny than ever before through a variety of means, from subpoenas to open records requests, and need to be prepared to respond to that scrutiny," said Halpern. Such investigations, he said, "can send the wrong message to researchers about how valuable their expertise is to society. We need scientists to engage in public conversations on science-based issues, no matter how contentious the topic."
The biggest difference between Smith's investigation today and the one Mann and Bradley faced in 2005, Mann said, is that "back then, there were a number of moderate pro-science, pro-environment Republicans who came to my defense. Chief among them was Sherwood Boehlert—an old-school Republican from upstate New York."
"Unfortunately, we no longer have moderate republicans like Boehlert chairing the House science committee," said Mann.
Shukla and his colleagues' letter was sent three weeks before an eight-month investigation by InsideClimate News showed that ExxonMobil's own research confirmed fossil fuels' role in climate change in the 1970s and 1980s. The company then spent the next two decades funding a campaign to derail climate regulations and question climate science.
"If corporations in the fossil fuel industry and their supporters are guilty of the misdeeds that have been documented in books and journal articles, it is imperative that these misdeeds be stopped as soon as possible," Shulka and the other climate scientists wrote in the letter.
Holdren wrote back to the researchers that "the [Obama] administration shares the concern expressed in the letter about the seriousness of the threat posed by climate change," according to ScienceInsider.
ScienceInsider also reported that Shulka is not the only signatory of the letter facing backlash. Attorney Christopher Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based libertarian think tank, filed a public records request with several of the signatories' universities for emails contained the words "RICO, racketeer, racketeering, DOJ, prosecute or prosecution."
"If they believe this is part of their job, we will not dispute that, but instead would like to see how the institutions were used in this innovative application of public education resources," Horner told ScienceInsider.
==
alpha busted, docs
http://www.theguardian.com/science/political-science/2015/aug/28/digging-into-big-coals-climate-connections
Have you heard about the group that has abused open records laws to harass climate scientists across the United States? The organization behind North Carolina’s ban on using sea level science to inform coastal planning? The institution attacking renewable energy targets?
These are all activities of the innocuous-sounding Energy and Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal). Now, thanks to a scoop by Lee Fang at The Intercept, we now know where some of their money comes from.
It’s the coal industry.
We have known for years that privately funded organizations have attacked climate scientists, both in the US and the UK, to the extent that they had to set up a legal defence fund. But we’ve known little about where their money comes from, beyond efforts to connect the dots between different groups.
Now, the bankruptcy filings of Alpha Natural Resources, a large Virginia-based coal company, provide a rare window into the list of political and advocacy organizations the company has funded. E&E Legal (formerly known as the American Tradition Institute) is one of them. Other recipients include the Heartland Institute, which compared climate scientists to the Unabomber, theAmerican Legislative Exchange Council and numerous others.
In the US, companies are usually not required to disclose this kind of spending, so public scrutiny is grossly inadequate. Trade associations and corporate front groups like E&E Legal are willing to do the dirty work that companies don’t want to associate themselves with. A recent Union of Concerned Scientists analysisfound that utility and energy companies are often unwilling to support publicly the climate change activities of the trade groups that represent them.
In a follow-up article, Fang zeroes in on attorney Chris Horner, who is connected to E&E Legal and a number of other organizations that have sought to undermine public understanding of climate science. According to the filing, Alpha provided money not only to groups with ties to Horner, but also to Horner personally.
One of the tactics embraced by Alpha-funded groups, individuals, and politicians is the harassment of scientists. In 2010, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli used an obscure health care fraud law to subpoenaemails, draft research papers, handwritten notes and other documents from the University of Virginia related to the work of climate scientist Michael Mann....
refs fang2
Christopher Horner, an attorney who claims that the earth is cooling, is known within the scientific community for hounding climate change researchers with relentless investigations and public ridicule, often deriding scientists as “communists” and frauds.
Horner is a regular guest on Fox News and CNN, and has been affiliated with a number of think tanks and legal organizations over the last decade. He has called for investigations of climate scientists affiliated with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and NASA, and inundated climate researchers at major universities across the country with records requests that critics say are designed to distract them from their work.
New court documents reveal one source of Horner’s funding: big coal.
Last Thursday’s bankruptcy filing of Alpha Natural Resources, one of the largest coal companies in America, includes line items for all of the corporation’s contractors and grant recipients. Among them are Horner individually at his home address, as well as the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, where he is a senior staff attorney.
Reached by phone today about his relationship with Alpha Natural Resources, Horner said he would get back with us. David W. Schnare, director of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, subsequently emailed a response neither confirming nor denying that Horner or his organizations have received funding from the coal giant. Schnare said that “nearly all” his organization’s donors “request that we not disclose their names” and noted that under IRS regulations it is not required to do so. Schnare also stated that “the sources of our funding have no role in which cases” his organization prosecutes.
The Alpha Natural Resources filing corroborates the suggestion in a recent email from chief executives of major coal firms that they are underwriting Horner’s current work.
In early June this year, the Coal & Investment Leadership Forum, a trade show, sent this message to its email list: “As the ‘war on coal’ continues, I trust that the commitment we have made to support Chris Horner’s work will eventually create great awareness of the illegal tactics being employed to pass laws that are intended to destroy our industry.” The email was signed by Alliance Resource Partners’ Joe Craft III, Alpha Natural Resources’ Kevin Crutchfield, Drummond Company’s Gary Drummond, Arch Coal’s John Eaves and United Coal Co.’s Jim McGlothlin.
Horner has played a prominent role in the climate science debate for many years, though he has failed to uncover wrongdoing.
In 2009, thousands of emails were hacked from climate researchers at the University of East Anglia. Horner quickly blogged that the “blue-dress moment may have arrived” and began appearing on media outlets to claim that the emails revealed “admissions of falsifying results, collaborating to subvert and violate the laws” in what he dubbed “Climategate.”
“Climategate” became a media phenomenon, with prominent politicians declaring that the emails revealed that climate change is a “hoax.” The Koch organization Americans for Prosperity traveled to international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in 2009 and proclaimed that the emails revealed a “scandal.”
Six official investigations later cleared the University of East Anglia scientists of accusations of any wrongdoing.
Horner has filed numerous records requests for personal emails from climate scientists and litigated to force universities to comply with his requests. Horner continued his investigations of climate scientists earlier this year by filing a records request with John Byrne, distinguished professor of energy climate policy at the University of Delaware. The request was made on behalf of the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic and the Energy & Environment Legal Institute, where Horner is a senior fellow.
“He has been instrumental in orchestrating the attacks on climate scientists over the past decade in the form of vexatious and frivolous FOIA demands, efforts to force scientists to turn over all of their personal email,” says Dr. Michael Mann, a climate scientist targeted by Horner.
Horner has also often cast scientists as villains. He claimed on Alex Jones’ program “Infowars” that climate science is a backdoor strategy for enacting “global governance.” On Fox News, Horner mysteriously claimed that White House science adviser John Holdren is “if not borderline communist — communist.”
In an interview with The Intercept, Dr. Gretchen T. Goldman of the Union of Concerned Scientists said it is “reprehensible” to learn that coal companies are “funding the harassment of scientists.”
==
Coal Execs Invite Presidential Hopeful Jeb Bush to Closed-Door Weekend Retreat (2015)
Drummond and other coal companies invited former Florida Governor and likely presidential candidate Jeb Bush to be the keynote speaker at the 2015 Coal and Investment Leadership Forum, an invitation-only retreat that brings together coal industry executives, Republican donors, and other "stakeholders," according to an invitation obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy and reported on by The Guardian. Bush "evidently signalled his willingness to meet with industry leaders as early as February when the hosts of the coal forum – all owners and executives of coalmining companies – emailed out the first save-the-date notices," The Guardian reported.[14]
“It is a great opportunity to meet with stakeholders in the state,” Kristy Campbell, a spokeswoman for Bush, said. “He will be talking about a variety of topics.”[14]
Bush had not yet officially declared his candidacy and was not disclosing fundraising information. "I think the major question is what promises is Jeb Bush making to the coal chief executives in that room. We assume Bush is there to raise money for his campaign [...] it is pretty clear why Jeb Bush was invited there. If Jeb Bush is elected they want him to protect their industry," Nick Surgey, research director of CMD, told The Guardian.[14]
Others named in the 2015 invitation included Tennessee Valley Authority president Bill Johns, **Christopher C. Horner** of the Competitive Enterprise Institute and Energy & Environment Legal Institute, and "the owners and chief executives of coalmining and energy companies" including Alliance Resource Partners, Alpha Natural Resources, Consol Energy, Arch Coal, and United Coal Company.[14]
==
9/15/14
hornerdoc.doc
HORNER
Chris Horner: (agenda 21, Am Spect, Aspen, BP, Cheney, Climategate, Cooch, ATI, Ebell, exxon, ICCC, Inhofe, Pompeo, Regnery)
Graduate of the Law School at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He claims winning an award for activism, but does not seem to exist. No resume available, so we have to piece together career trajectory. We know that he was a lobbyist for Enron in the late 90's.
Enron Corporation — Past director of Federal Government Relations (1997). This was before CA ripoff, Davis hit and accounting scandal/implosion, but is reflective of corruption, "hardball politics" win at any cost, let's deregulate everything so we can plunder it.
1997 Cooler Heads Coalition (CEI, Ebell, Norquist, cfact, CRC, Ridenour) — Oversees petitions and litigation for the Cooler Heads Coalition in "environment and energy issues, international environmental treaties, and climate policy." [8] Also listed as a "Contributor." [9] Cooler heads was revived in 2004 by ACSH Whelan, still exists, Horner featured with Ebell and Marlo Lewis, founders (also Chesser) differs from GCC (1989-2002) in that the latter was API and corporations (declared victory and disbanded 2002].
{“In October 2000, Competitive Enterprise Institute (along with Ebell and Inhofe) sued the Clinton administration over a National Assessment on Climate Change produced by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Bush 41 got talked into going to the first/ Rio Earth Summit, and was convinced climate was at least enough of a problem to authorize NAS to look into it (1990 law requires the US government to issue a report every four years? Greens sued to make b43 do it, but second assessment did not appear until Obama administration in 2009; the Third was notable for its over three hundred authors from over a dozen federal agencies, and its detalled explanation for what will happen to US by region [and industry?]). A news release announcing 2000 the lawsuit claimed that various procedural rules had been violated during the process of developing the report, labeling it "junk science" and a "$14 million compilation of global warming scare stories." } Used Tozzi's bogus Data Quality Act, the suit was dismissed with prejudice
[[“A dismissal with prejudice is a judgment rendered in a lawsuit on its merits that prevents the plaintiff from bringing the same lawsuit against the same defendant in the future. It is a harsh remedy that has the effect of canceling the action so that it can never again be commenced. A dismissal with prejudice is Res Judicata as to every issue litigated in the action.”
]]
In early 2000's he worked for Tech Cental Station, begun in 2000 by DCI Public Relations group, heavily involved with the tobacco industry (though competed with APCO, more or less created specfically for this purpose). This might explain its really impressive stable of hacks and other climate deniers who styled themselves as some kind of expert (if nothing else on how addressing climate would ruin the economy; TCC commissioned Charles River to do a study demonstrating that it would cost the average family anywhere from 300 to 1500 dollars per month). Also has fairly extensive roster of neo-cons, especially when it morphed into a televison show (even on some PBS stations). Presuably they could atttract talent because of generous funding from Exxon, Coca-Cola, McDonalds (did a hit on SuperSize Me) and Phrma (keeping those evil Canadian perscription drugs at bay). Young Horner is simply listed as a writer (Inhofe is listed more puzzlingly as "favorite").
Recall that the uber-strategy, borrowed from tobacco, is to doubt the science. Every delay is a win because it allows the profitable death to continue. Horner goes to the dark side, since he goes on the offensive. Since he can win on the facts, he has to attack the scientists. In addition, because climatology is very technical, it tends to come down to who do you trust in the "duelling soundbite" situation [see Hayhoe on Moyers 9/13/14 on how denier political conservative leaders stepped into the vacuum of leadership by evangelical clergy]. Morover, as we have seen, do nothing/wait and see position is attractive for theological, psychological and ideological reasons.
An additional bonus of attacking the scientists is the mirroring strategy: if real climate scientists lie for money (as perhaps press and even people were realizing "hacks" had been doing for some time, due to hard and smart work by, for example, Greenpeace's Exxon Secrets website/map), then a pox on both their houses (or at best, wake me when there's a consensus/winner).
At least the later accusation against Hansen taking money was based on prizes he won for his courageous advocacy. Since he was point man in the head agency dealing with climate in the most rabidly anti-science/green administration he had every reason to believe he would be fired on some pretext (or hounded/neutralized by, for example having to get his public remarked vetted, or having a former Bush-Cheney campaign worker be his Soviet-style handler until he was sacked for lying on his resume). This accusation works nicely with the "rock-star" strategy, which uses the generally hard-won popularity/influence/integrity of a person as a reason to debase them (that is, they lie for fame as well as the money that goes with it). This is an inversion in the line of Rove mentor Atwater steal fromArt of War: attack where your opponent is strongest. It's evil because trust is an integral part of the commons, since cynicism leads to ignorance and inaction that brings down democracy/republics.
2001
Horner has accused NASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe." Horner stated that Hansen had "clearly abused his platform provided to him by the taxpayer, principally by the way he's been exposed of manipulating and revising data with the strange coincidence of him always found on the side of exaggerating the warming." (DeSmogBlog profile Chris Horner). Hansen is an essential target because he represents NASA, one of our most prestigious government agencies of any kind (beat the Commies to the Moon, Right Stuff machismo etc). Moreover, he called CEI for its infamous CO2, we call it Life ads, and later went after coal and energy ceo's as criminals. His biggest/original sin was his 1988 Congrssional testimony which pulled no punches. Bush 43 administration tried to muzzle him, and he fully expected to be fired, but had to speak out or he knew he would not be able to look his grandkids in the eye.
So important is Hansen that Horner will repeat attacks later.
see Tozzi John Graham, OIRA/DQA
Data Quality Act used by Sam Kazman and Horner to beat up Christine Todd Whitman on climate 2002 (her EPA report supported the National Assessment) (myron ebell said cei would call for firing in cooney smoking gun email)[both milloy and ebell work for cei, though ebell director and milloy was adjunct]
2004 TCC CEI (if not before) not entirely clear when he began at CEI, but his current title is Senior Fellow, and he has 43 screens of content listed on their site, going back to Washington Times2000 articles e.g., “Apocalypse Soon: Climate Assessment is Based on Fear.” He cranks out numerous articles, the odd book, and he is a frequent and telegenic media spokesman, but presumably his most damaging function is legal.
In 2007 Horner took another run at character assassination of James Hansen:
Horner has accusedNASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe." Horner told Fox News that Hansen has "clearly abused his platform provided to him by the taxpayer, principally by the way he's been exposed of manipulating and revising data with the strange coincidence of him always found on the side of exaggerating the warming." [8]rep.
Horner appeared on Glenn Beck's May 2, 2007 special "Exposed: The Climate of Fear" with usual suspect hacks like John Christy and John Coleman TV weatherman. In the same year Regnery published his Politically Incorrectbook which he flogged on Jon Stewart Daily Show, in which the flustered host failed to lay a glove on him (even resorting to asking Horner if he had killed a hobo; in fact at one point when Horner had defly parried, he was reduced to mockingly tell his audience fans “Settle down,“ like a harried high school teacher ). [Stewart also punked on Climategate, but he was not alone in that, even in the legitimate press; later got on right side of issue, though John Oliver may be best of all?]
[“The inside flap of Horner's book "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism" states that "for decades, environmentalism has been the Left's best excuse for increasing government control over our actionsin ways both large and small.It's for Mother Earth! It's for the children! It's for the whales! But until now, the doomsday-scenario environmental scares they've trumped up haven't been large enough to justify the lifestyle restrictions they want to impose. With global warming, however, greenhouse gasbags can argue that auto emissions in Ohio threaten people in Paris,and that only 'global governance' (Jacques Chirac's words) [French, thus prolly commie?] can tackle such problems." [6]“]
Here, if not before, Horner crosses over into tin foil hat territory, but he does exemplify a meme that has become prominent in at least two domains. The Tea Party revives a number of somewhat discreditied and dormant strains of the right, such as militias and anti-Commie. Agenda 21 was a completely benign and purely voluntary idea that if a city is going to undertake some substantial change, it should at least consider how amenities such as green spaces and bike paths could be worked in. Out of this has come innumerable black helicopter (to take our incandesent bulbs) and blue hull navy and FEMA concentration camp dark fantasies. This seems laughable until you realize that every GOP nominee for president in 2008 primaries subscribed not just to climate denial but to some degree to Agenda 21 (with the posible exception of Huntsman, but his dad was bankrolling him, even in a campaign in which Bachmann and Cain were frontrunners for fifteen minutes, he never was?). It gets a bit lost in the reparte, but Stewart ventures that all the emissions we pump into atmosphere must have some effect, and that wonders why scientists would enter into an elaborate worldwide effort (over years, presumably) to lie about climate. Are they really commies who want us to crap in holes? Horner replies that socialists and communists are aligned with the Greens; he calims he went to a wealth alleviation conference w/ german greens who stated their aim (from a PR pov?) to make it worse to clear a forest than sell a child to Asian brothel. Here Horner plugs into tired myth that greens care about nature but not people. Complete nonsense, since greens see the two as inextricable: it's the corporatists who see America as exceptionalist: we do not have to follow the norms of international behavior, the market or even the laws of physics.
The other domain in which the Green world takeover scenario.scare/scam shows up is in the Conservative Entertainment Complex: Jesse Ventura faux 60 Minutes style Conspiracy Theory [with no sense of irony in the title?]. Penn and Teller reduce it to a scam to make money (not sure there's a gov't or world gov't angle] 3rd domain is green dragon, Fundamentalist Christian. (they want to brainwash our kids with pagan gods in the guise of recycling). Another variant is common in Gore attacks (took over after hypocrite wore out)
2008 First ICCC Heartland conference, Horner is a speaker (also 2010). Red Hot Lies (Regnery again) is basically an attack on the science, using the standard myths.
2009 ATP sued Longmont, CO over their Fair Campaign Practices Act. Otto: “WTP/ATP also fights laws that restrict corporate money in elections or require disclosure of contributions. In 2009, the group sued Longmont, CO over their Fair Campaign Practices Act. The city settled and agreed to drop disclosure requirements. In 2010, after the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, WTP/ATP successfully challenged the constitutionality of the Montana Corrupt Practices Act of 1912, which prohibited independent political expenditures by corporations. “
A number of cities and towns, some in Colorado, have been passing local ordinances to, for example, limit where and when farmers can spray sewer sludge, since it contains pathogens and heavy metals (killed at least one healthy teenaged boy). Or to limit fracking from contaminating wells and the air, or to keep corporations from buying the water or local elections. These have been fought ferociously, even though these town are small sometimes, because the precedent of defeat is scary because it can be replicated. Corporations often assert Constitional rights of persons. Horner does not seem to be involved , the lawyer was Gessler, who moved up to Colorado Secretary of State (who planned to go back and moonlight for Hackstaff, ATP's lawyer in Colorado, presumably on fracking cases, but was shamed out of it). Gerssler has tried to suppress vote (Colorado at state level recently shifted to Democrats after a long period as a red state) and failesd to raise contribution limits from $200 to 5,000. He may run against Hickenlooper, who has not been nice enough to fracking.
These skirmishes could end up being important nationally, but ATP has already had a devastating effect: when Justice Roberts' laughable prediction that the Citzens United decision would not even create the appearance of improprity was promptly discreditied by a 8 billion dollar tsunami of secret cash, many expected if for no other reason that the court save face (recall they could have ruled narrowly on the techical question of whether the “hit” job video on Hillary Clinton could be shown 60 days before the election, or was it just the ads for it?] that they would look for the first excuse to review it. Sadly no. Montana had a hundred years of anti-bribery election law (one of the Copper Kings reportedly used to just heave stacks of cash over the transom into legislators offices), but when they tried to keep using it after CU ruling, they were sued by ATP. The state supreme court of course upheld its own law, but SCOTUS dismissed it in a sentence.
Amerian Traditions Parnership seems to be a Western clone/wannabe Citizens United funded byMontana petroleum millionaire Doug Lair. Initially it just laundered money for hit piece direct mail in 2008 and 2010 elections, mostly in Colorado and Montana (sometimes making a fake newspaper for this purpose). It broke elections laws (mostly just by failing to report, maybe just sloppy or out of some sort of ideological notion that they should not have to report). At some point their records from a stolen car turned up in a meth house and were turned over to authorites (let us pause a moment to reflect that meth-heads are appalled by low morals of ATP]. Politcal operative Christian Lefer goes to ground, but Donny Ferguson goes south to be campaign manager for Steve Stockman, loon of Texas (tried to pass a law to prevent US from participating in war games with China).
2009 Climategate was a tremendous Christmas present to the Denialsphere, not coincidently just when they needed it most, on the eve of Copenhagen, COP15, just when the US was becoming seriously separated if not the laughingtstock of the world for its climate denial (Inhofe's two of three of Truth Squad deserted him, and he only lasted three hours; Monkcton et al tried to hold the fort, at one point calling hecklers Hitler Youth]. The evidence and consensus was so overwhelming, most observers thought international action was all but inevitable. Obama showed up, even crashing a meeting he was not invited to in an attempt to engage China? Who had just surpasse US as number one emitter, and withput whom no deal matters.
Climategate (unlike Glacier-gate, or Pauchi-gate, anyone remember those? Buehler?] seemed to confirm the lunacy that Horner and others had been spouting for some time: the scientists were lying. (Horner accused Mann of deleting emails? he actually stopped others from doing it?). Lying for political and/or monetary reasons (or theological, if you buy it's the new religion/faith argument that Horner puts forward in Red Hot Lies). Even the press bought it, for a while, and though all the scientists were repeatedly cleared by independent investigation on both sides of the Atlantic, the corrections came weeks or months later, weren't deemed newsworthy, and at any rate the damage was done. In 2009, though he was no no way involved in Climategate, Hansen is dealing with FOIA requests (Horner's specialty). Hansen was arrested in 2009 and 2010 protesting mountaintop mining, and has been rightly critical of coal. Retired April 2013 to devote more time to activism.
Romm: Gavin Schmidt has done a wonderful job at RealClimate patiently explaining the context of the stolen emails. He’s made it perfectly clear that the claims of scientific malpractice are without foundation. He must be doing a really good job, because the Competitive Enterprise Institute intends to sue him.” Clearly his RealClimate blog is not part of his official duties, but that's the basis of their suit. See below
February 27, 2009
Horner accused NASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe."
Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America(Regnery, 2010) Ag21 Another book, right on schedule, where he presumably goes deeper into tin foil hat Agenda 21
As we shall see shortly when he goes after Michael Mann, apparently Horner et al. have flexible standards for academic misconduct and lack of scientific integrity:
2010 Wegman: The "Wegman Report", led by Edward Wegman [8] of George Mason University (GMU) got criticized in 2010's Experts claim 2006 climate report plagiarized [9]. Experts called it "obvious" even "shocking" plagiarism. GMU's [10] incompetent handling, mistreatment of complainants and flawed rulings were mostly documented in March [10], but recent FOIAs [11]expose more [12] untruths....However, a few groups in GMU are closely, even uniquely enmeshed with people behind the machinery of anti-science, such as Charles Koch [17], Ken Cuccinelli [18], David Schnare [19], Fred Singer [20], and Pat Michaels [21], plus the Heartland Institute [22] and key Washington think tanks. GMU even has a long history of tobacco connections, oddly relevant [23]. (mashey)
David Schnare is the "Director of the Center for Environmental Stewardship" at the Thomas Jefferson Institute Stinktank which funds and publishes his “research” (funded by Art Pope, the Southern Koch brother by another mother). Former? EPA office of enforcement counsel (sort of oxymoronic, like military intelligence?)
This lack of outrage in Wegman case may have to do with the fact that their Environmental Law Clinic is based at GMU: teaches how to FOIA and use other underhanded tactics to roll back green protections:
Renamed Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, booted by GMU? Perhaps not a coincicence at ATP/Institite gets rebranded E&E after implosion/outing:
bs:
“The FME Law Clinic provides litigation and research services to qualified clients. We concentrate on cases involving landmark free-market pro-environmental litigation; use of open records and data quality laws to force greater governmental accountability and transparency; and, cases that allow the Clinic to help create the next generation of free market oriented attorneys. The Clinic has paired with the American Tradition Institute in order to prosecute three cases, described below. In addition, the Clinic has an active Freedom of Information Act practice. Current FOIAs are also listed below. At the bottom of this page is a brief description of new litigation the Clinic is contemplating pursuing.”
ALEC has a concerted campaign in a number of states, with some successes, of rolling back renewablwe energy goals:
bs American Tradition Institute v. State of Colorado, et al. (filed April 4, 2011)
American Tradition Institute’s Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the constitutionality of Colorado’s Renewable Energy Standard, based upon evidence that the state’s law violates the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The Commerce Clause reserves the regulation of interstate commerce to the federal government.
2011 Competitive Enterprise Institute to sue RealClimate blogger over moderation policy.
Cooch starts to attack Mann April 2010
“January 6, 2011
The American Tradition Institute, a free-market think tank that routinely attacks climate scientists and refuses to accept the scientific consensus on climate change, submits a Freedom of Information Act Request to the University of Virginia for the same personal correspondence that Attorney General Cuccinelli is seeking through his subpoenas. The Washington Post notes that the American Tradition Institute has affiliations with the Competitive Enterprise Institute and Exxon Mobil, both of which have sown doubt about climate science in the past.”]
“In May 2011, Horner asked the University of Virginia for access to thousands of e-mails and documents by Michael Mann who had left the university several years earlier. The request, backed by the Freedom of Information Act, was on behalf of the American Tradition Institute.” Here Horner is taking the handoff from Cuccinelli, who had tried for years and failed to pervert a fraud statute. Even more absurd, since Mann did not even work in Virginia anymore, but Climategate notoriety helped, and the Hockey Stick was still a central bone of contention. So Horner switch to the favorite FOIA harassment. Happily, when some wanabe bloggers were trying to make their bones, they belieived or at least took up Horner attacks, and Mann has successfully sued them for libel (who knew that comparing a guy to a child molester was not cricket?), which could take down the old if not venerable National Review. Cuccinelli and Horner lose every round, and a variety of academic bodies andnewspaper condemn the witchunt. FIRE?
2012 ATP (changed name 2010) Western Traditions Partnership Montana case 2011 (no Horner?) SCOTUS June 2012
2012: Horner “ has sought access to communications from Michael Mann, the author of the hockey stick graph, the NASA climate scientists James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt, and this year, Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist at Texas Tech University.” Schmidt as a target makes sense because he is clear and eloquent in his defense of Mann's Hockey Stick and Climategate, and he has credibilty with the press and public. Moreover, he is willing to mix it up, debating their star Lindzen and Crichton, whereas the Gore is afrqad to debate has been a winner for a decade or so. Hayoe came to public notice after Gingrich dumped the chapter he asked her to write after Limbaugh objected, referring to her as a “climate babe” (as some sort of consolation?). However, she has become increasingly important in converting (sorry) evangelicals to stweardship, but more perhaps more importantly punching a hole in the Greens/scientists are godless/pagans who only care about polar bears.
11/2012 sues EPA pm 2.5, Lisa Jackson :Jumped shark on human experimentation:
seems really bizzare on its face, but is probably more an externsion of earlier efforts than a radical departure. The charge is that the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, under the auspices of the EPA, did not tell them that they were being gassed with diesel exhaust and more worrying particulate matter, which, to hear them tell it, can kill almost immediately. To support this contention, they brought in ACSH's John Dunn, MD JD, which is not surprosing since they have been hired liars for corporations for decades, but what is surprising is that Dunn had been making precisely the opposite argument for decades against air pollution regulations (ozone, CO2, etc.). One person who volunteered to participate claims severe coughing/lung damage, and is asking two million dollars for treatment presumably, but also pain and suffering/trauma (where is tort reform when you need it?). Another plaintiff is listed as a member of ATP? Even more heartbreaking, the lawyers themselves have been terribly traumatized:
Milloy claims to have an uncle in a concetration camp where medical experiements were done, and thus is traumatized by the EPA: “16. Mr. Milloy has dedicated a majority of his current work effort to expose and stop the EPA's improper, unethical and illegal human experimentation. Mr. Milloy is deeply
aggrieved by the kind of human experimentation being conducted by the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency and will not be relieved until it stops.”...
“19. Dr. Schnare’s parents selected his name, David, to honor the last male relative to
die before his birth. That man’s name was David Steiner, a Jew who died in Buchenwald
concentration camp on May 3, 1945, 21 days after the camp was liberated. “
horner on case? Trauma?
Schnare? States he was married near the campus where the experiments were done, and can not even walk by EPA building (and enjoy the aesthetics of the building?) in DC without anguish.
They make many demands to ease their trauma, but here their true aim becomes clear: “"Fourth, Plaintiffs seek injunctive relief requiring EPA to withdraw and destroy or excise any publications in any form that are based, even in part, on results of illegal human experimentation. “
…
or to regulate based on the study:
G. Seventh Claim for Relief
“To repair ethical lapses and as a matter of equitable relief, Plaintiffs ask the Court
tostay implementation of any rules authorized under the Clean Air Act to control fine particulate
matter until such time as the Agency can review the regulatory basis it used in their
promulgation, amend its support documents and otherwise reevaluate the risks from fine
particulate matter to ensure EPA does not rely in any fashion upon illegal human
experimentation. “ (emphasis added)
2014 Mayfly Mountaintop removal: claims EPA pulling a permit is a wacky plan to save Mayfly; anti-MTR campaigners are a source of hope, for a number of reasons: they are winning, despite being poor; it is essential to beat coal because it is not only the main/worst source of CO2 but also mercury. Serious health threats, see Gunnoe. "In October 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced plans to veto the Clean Water Act (CWA) permit for the largest mountaintop removal mine in West Virginia, the Spruce No.1 Mine in Logan County."
"Now, four years later, the research has caught up with what the people knew all along: it is not just about bugs. The scientific evidence is piling up associating living near mountaintop removal sites with birth defects, low birth weight births, cancer, poor physical health, poor mental health, cardiovascular difficulties, and pulmonary difficulties. This may not be news to the people who live there." (McFerrin)
3/14 Obama science advisor John Holdren takes down Pielke Jr after attacked; also Se. Jeff Sessions claimed Holdren mislead the publicv based on Pielke's cherypicked testimony; asked to prove Pielke out of mainstream and Holdren did.
This may be no coincidence:
5/14 “Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute sued the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) for flouting the Freedom of Information Act. CEI's Chris Horner asked OSTP to produce work-related emails that OSTP's Director, John Holdren, stored in an email account at his former employer, the environmental-pressure group Woods Hole Research Center.”
Currently, FME Clinic is
Shopping for someone to pay them the force the Forest Service to log (No Tree Left Behind):
Prospective Cases
ATI v. US. Forest Service – ATI is seeking support for, and asked FME Law to prepare, a FOIA, Endangered Species Act and Data Quality Act petition-litigation action to force full implementation of National Forest Management Plans that require logging in order to prevent forest fires that causing destruction of endangered species habitat and which would also create new timber and mill jobs and reinvigorate a moribund national timber industry.
A_ Association v. EPA – The FME Law Clinic is preparing a petition-litigation action to force EPA to revise rules costing over $60 billion and which fail to properly target the actual source of harmful PM2.5 air pollutants, regulating industries that do not contribute to the hazard and failing to regulate some that do.” surely a defense of coal, but who is allowed to pollute but not stopped by EPA (or not williong to pay ATP/E&E protection money? Public transit?
Analysis: Horner is well networked, photogenic, articulate, (even a sense of humor/wit) though his official PR photo has an odd sense of high school yearbook awkwardness. Clearly he is a clever ideological entrepreneur who has postioned himself to capitalize on the Pension Plan (CEI is the 800 pound gorilla think tank in terms of climate denial). Hard to tell if he's a True Believer or not. Deft use of mirroring tactics, expecially in neutralizing the legal strategies that became the mainstay of the environmental movement in the 80/90's when it became harder to mobilize people in the streets. But law is of course an important moderating force (can be ground-breaking like Brpwn v Board, or the last stand (literally when somone brought a taxidermied Spotted Owl in a hearing to protect the last old growth forest [bonus if you got the pun]. Thus him neutraluizing tge law and undermining science earns the moniker Completely Evil Institute” (Lambert). 10 pages
capt 9/14
promoted to UBER, went after hansen and mann, plus bunch of lawsuits eg polar bear, not to mention ATI
posterboy for CEI legal?
missing link in ATI to world/RWW? ===
pdf affadavit said no office/lawyer in colo thus hackett? sp
e&e addy 9/14 722 12th St., NW, 4th Floor
Washington, D.C. 20005
202-785-8301
Ronald Reagan Legacy Project
722 12th Street, NW
Fourth Floor
Washington, DC 20005
202.785.0266 Office
202.785.0261 Fax
Staff:
Grover Norquist, Chairman
Anna Henderson, Executive Director
==
===
:{http://www.thenation.com/authors/naomi-klein:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
==
see schnare
note co-plaintiff suing/foia holdren is http://fmelawclinic.org/?page_id=36
outed/tossed out or metastisizing?
"The IRS has granted 501(c)(3) status to the Clinic. The Clinic’s EIN is 45-1602963.
The FME Law Clinicprovides legal representation and research. The Clinic is organized to provide a platform to train law students and provide them clinical experience while offering public interest law services. Originally incorporated as the George Mason Environmental Law Clinic, the Directors of FME Law engaged in a friendly and supportive discussion with the Dean of the George Mason University School of Law and recognized that the clinic could better perform its function by servicing multiple law schools as a stand-alone clinic. The Board thus directed a name change to reflect this broadened purpose. Until completion of the legal transition to its new name, the Clinic is doing business as the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic but must retain its original name for banking and tax purposes.
In choosing to operate as a law clinic independent of any specific law school, it replicates the successful approach used by many other law clinics. It remains in close cooperation with George Mason University’s School of Law and provides both academic courses and clinical opportunities for GMU Law students and is expanding its externship program to other law schools that have a doctrinal focus on law and economics.
Donation are accepted at:
:{The Free Market Environmental Law Clinic
9033 Brook Ford Road
Burke, VA 22015}:
Until the name change is formally complete, checks should be made out to:
The George Mason Environmental Law Clinic" endit
---
schnare
9033 Brook Ford Road is located in Burke, VA. At this time, the property has an estimated value of $485,700 and yearly taxes of $4,520. This home has 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, and approximately 1,394 sqft of living space. The property was built in 1973. Similar homes nearby have 4 bedrooms, 3 baths and sell for around $475,000.
---
linked to fox nation)
Conservative group sues EPA over its ‘IRS-like’ tactics
:{
A conservative environmental law group is suing the Environmental Protection Agency over its alleged “IRS-like” tactics, including stone-walling federal records requests and imposing fees on conservative groups that sought government records.
The Energy & Environment Legal Institute is trying to force the EPA to release records previously denied under a Freedom of Information Act request looking for agency records regarding clean water rules as they relate to mining operations. E&E Legal argues that such information is crucial to the public understanding issues surrounding the EPA’s “War on Coal.”
In this case, E&E Legal was looking for records regarding the EPA’s veto of an already-granted permit to a coal mine in Logan County, W.V. The EPA vetoed the permit to save the mayfly, an insect that the agency says is harmed by surface mining.[actually important MTR EJ case, thus evil]
“EPA’s behavior is a clear parallel to the IRS’s targeting of conservative groups,” E&E Legal counsel Chris Horner told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Both impose financial hurdles in the way of groups they disapprove of, draining resources from those they see as threats and impeding the groups from pursuing their mission.”
“That we have learned that the Office of Inspector General is preparing to yet again cover for these abuses only adds to the similarities,” Horner added.
E&E Legal says the EPA has hindered six attempts by the group to get government records related to the EPA mayfly decision. The EPA has refused to waive FOIA-related feesto the group, saying that E&E “failed to express an intention to broadly disseminate” the requested information. E&E says it has gone so far as to insert a picture of a “chalkboard” in a FOIA request with the phrase “We intend to broadly disseminate responsive information” written ten times. The EPA even denied this request.
“The [FOIA] request is being blocked by the latest in a pattern of behavior by the agency directed at plaintiffs, improperly denying the fee waiver provided by statute for non-profit groups that broadly disseminate public information of significant public interest,” :{Horner writes in his court filing:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:.
“They are of significant public interest due to the ongoing controversy surrounding the EPA’s “War on Coal,’” Horner adds. “Particularly, the EPA’s actions concerning mining activity through the regulation of selenium for its possible impact on insect populations are ongoing matters of public controversy.”
===
msg bd:
:{
}:Inhofe seeks to force the EPA to report the costs of its rules:{
1:39 PM 04/01/2014
Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Inhofe introduced a bill }:to force the Environmental Protection Agency to enforce its own rules:{ and report the costs of agency regulations.
Inhofe’s bill would prevent the EPA from issuing any new major rules }:until it follows the law:{ and starts reporting economic costs.
“Americans are not as aware of the costs that have come from the regulations of this administration,” Inhofe told reporters on a conference call. “[They're] essentially putting people out of business.”
}:The Clean Air Act (CAA) already requires the EPA to report the impact of its regulations across the economy, but the Obama administration has failed to enforce this part of the law:{.
Inhofe aims to force EPA to enforce CAA Section 321(a) and report the costs of its rules.
“This would put teeth in Section 321(a),” Inhofe said.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2014/04/01/in...#ixzz2xfLLOzcR}:
then links to mayfly
but...
Winds of Change Newsletter,June 2010 See sidebar for table of contents
EPA May Veto Largest MTR Mine; Environmental Justice Concerns Cited for First Time in Decision
In October 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced plans to veto the Clean Water Act (CWA) permit for the largest mountaintop removal mine in West Virginia, the Spruce No.1 Mine in Logan County.
In his Coal Tattoo blog, journalist Ken Ward, Jr., noted, "Environmental groups have been fighting the Spruce Mine since 1998, when it was proposed as a 3,113-acre mine that would bury more than 10 miles of streams in the Pigeonroost Hollow area near Blair."
In 1998 the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy and Blair residents and OVEC members James and Sibby Weekley and Carlos Gore (then an OVEC board member) filed the lawsuit that came to be known as Bragg v. Robertson. Subsequent years of litigating and organizing have reduced the size of the permit and kept most of the mining from starting. Longtime members of OVEC may recall being asked numerous times to attend hearings or comment on this permit In March 2010, the EPA took the next step toward vetoing the Spruce permit by issuing its "proposed determination" to block the CWA permit issued for the Spruce No. 1 mine by the Army Corps of Engineers.
The Charleston Gazette reported that the EPAs action continues a formal process including a public comment period and a hearing that could ultimately lead to a veto of the mines CWA permit, although the process could take a year or more.
In its 46-page decision and accompanying 33-page technical document, the EPA detailed its concerns about the broad-ranging negative impacts of mountaintop removal, from the burial of streams and downstream pollution to the destruction of forests and studies linking living near mining operations to premature death among Appalachian residents.
"And for the first time in a regulatory document, the EPA cited environmental justice concerns about whether mining unfairly foists negative impacts on low-income populations in the coalfields,"theGazette reported.
The proposed determination states, "The mountains being affected by Spruce No. 1 are considered a cultural resource by many residents. The mountains influence residents daily lives and in many cases have helped define Appalachian society. Removing them may have profound cultural changes on area residents, so it is important that cultural impacts be considered as well."
This is exactly what those of us working to end mountaintop removal have been saying for years.
Via comments written and oral, we tried to get the negative effects of mountaintop removal on people included in the massive mountaintop removal/valley fill environmental impact statement (EIS) assorted agencies completed during the Bush administration.
And, last year, OVEC joined other Appalachian groups in filing a petition to the EPA contending that the agency has failed to address the environmental justice aspects really human rights issues of mountaintop removal/steep-slope mining. Then, in January, seven members of the assorted groups traveled to DC (six others joined by conference call) to discuss the petition in person with officials from the EPA and other agencies and our allies Earthjustice and the Sierra Club.
Writing in the Highlands Voice, WV Highlands Conservancy mining chair Cindy Rank recently noted:
"Perhaps most refreshing of all to me and others who have watched one family after another, one community after another, dissolve away in the wake of ever-expanding mountaintop removal operations is the inclusion of environmental justice considerations in the proposed Spruce veto and comprehensive guidance (see page 7).
"Despite countless hours of testimony and meetings and comments and discussions with members of affected communities, agencies responsible bypass pleas to consider just such factors
"As years go by and huge mining operations continue to expand, more and more people and communities have felt the effects of nearby mining and their voices have grown strong. Undaunted in their efforts, impacted citizens have reached deep into some amazing storehouses of strength and courage. Indefatigable in their willingness to travel great distances to meet with Congressional representatives, talk with like-minded but uninformed citizens throughout the country, to share their stories in countless documentaries, publications, public hearings and media events, they have heightened the awareness that consideration of life and home and culture must be more fully and fairly accounted for in evaluating the pros and cons, the costs/benefits, the value of granting or denying mine permits that so fundamentally impact people. They have put a human face on the legal arguments to protect the environment and those who are part of that environment."
Rank then points us to the Federal Register Notice pertaining to the Spruce veto:
"Although the Spruce No. 1 Draft EIS contained some information regarding environmental justice, EPA remains concerned that these issues were not adequately addressed in the Final EIS.
"Spruce No. 1 is located in a Census block group where the per capita income is roughly half that of the national average and $6,000 less than the West Virginia state average. Moreover, 24 percent of the residents of Logan County live below the poverty line, which also exceeds state and national averages. Accordingly, additional analysis of the potential for disproportionately high and adverse effects on these low-income populations needs to be conducted."
As this issue of Winds of Change goes to press, we were preparing for the May 18 public hearing on the proposed veto of Spruces CWA permit.
Join our action alert list to hear more about this and other current events. (Click on "**:{Action Alerts:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**" at **:{www.ohvec.org:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:** to join.)
--
:{IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT BUGS:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
By John McFerrin
Four years ago we were treated to a series of television ads featuring dancing bugs, the bugs that critics of mountaintop removal strip mining were supposedly dedicated to saving. The ads made the unsupported claim that valley fills do nothing to permanently damage the habitats of aquatic insects. The subtext of the ads was ridicule of regulation of this kind of mining. Who in their right mind, the ad implied, would jeopardize the foundation of the state’s economy to save a bunch of bugs? As cute as the bugs (or at least their TV commercial dancing version) might be, why should society do anything to try to help them?
In addition to their factual inaccuracies (the bugs reported that valley fills didn’t cause them any hardship), the commercials were based upon a false assumption. They assumed that the bugs existed in isolation. Even were they to be wiped out, the commercial implied, there would be no great loss to society. Why bother regulating mountaintop removal strip mining just to save a bunch of bugs?
Such an assumption ignores the basic principal of ecology: it is all connected. Natural systems only work when they have all their parts. Start eliminating some parts-be they bugs, birds, bees, whatever-and the rest of it won’t work.
The Environmental Protection Agency recognizes this. In the Mountaintop Mining Valley Fills in Appalachia Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement it said:
Most of the streams discussed in this PEIS are considered headwater streams. Headwater streams are generally important ecologically because they contain not only diverse aquatic assembledges, but some unique aquatic species. Headwater streams also provide organic energy that is critical to fish and other aquatic species throughout an entire river.
:{The judicial system recognizes this, treating it as a fact accepted by all sides. In one of the cases on the legality of one aspect of mountaintop removal strip mining, one of the judges remarked
}: Today’s decision will have far-reaching consequences for the environment of Appalachia. It is not disputed that the impact of filling valleys and headwaters streams is irreversible or that headwater streams provide crucial ecosystem functions.
At the time the commercials came out, there was a reaction from those who lived in communities where the mines were located. Typical was that of James Tawney, a West Virginia Highlands Conservancy member who wrote to The Highlands Voice:
I want to let everyone know that the other habitat that we’re fighting for is our habitat. You know, those of us who live with a valley fill in our backyard, or a slurry impoundment hovering above our communities, homes and schools, or have lost our well water because of blasting. That’s whose habitat we’re trying to save!
Now, four years later, the research has caught up with what the people knew all along: it is not just about bugs. The scientific evidence is piling up associating living near mountaintop removal sites with birth defects, low birth weight births, cancer, poor physical health, poor mental health, cardiovascular difficulties, and pulmonary difficulties. This may not be news to the people who live there.
What is new is the nature of the evidence. For years, if not decades, people in mining communities have been sitting around in their living rooms saying, “Sure is a lot of cancer around here.” Now we have careful study by serious researchers confirming that, yes, there is a lot of cancer around here, more than there is in communities not occupied by mountaintop removal mining. The same is true for the other health effects. The studies are published in academic journals, the kind of journals where articles are reviewed by other qualified researchers, a process designed to weed out reports of flawed studies or unsubstantiated claims. One of the more prominent researchers, Dr. Michael Hendryx, calls the epidemiological evidence of adverse health effects “overwhelming.” (See story on the facing page).
The studies do not answer the question of the exact mechanism by which the mining causes the health effects. They don’t say whether the disease is a result of bad water, bad air, noise, all of these, or something else. They just say that people who live near mining are less healthy than similar people living in similar communities where mining is not present.
In other words, what people have said all along is true: opposing mountaintop removal strip mining is not just fighting to save bugs.
Old commercials never die; they just move to Youtube. To see the bug commercials, go to**:{http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=8ahRleExjY4:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{ and }
:{ . The Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition has collected studies on the health impacts of living in a community occupied by mountaintop removal mining. For links to the studies, go to}:**:{http://www.ohvec.org/issues/mountaintop_removal/articles/health/index.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
Written by Administrator in: **:{Mountaintop Removal:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**,**:{The Highlands Voice:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:** |
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=8ahRleExjY4
===
ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT LEGAL INSTITUTE )
2020 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW #186 )
Washington, DC 20006 )
FREE MARKET ENVIRONMENTAL
LAW CLINIC )
9033 Brook Ford Road )
Burke, Virginia, 22015 )
Plaintiffs
--
:{Michael Bastasch
===
ggle
oddly he is not listed as cei above:
E&E Legal http://eelegal.org/
:{Registrant ID:CR151231701
Registrant Name:Craig Richardson
Registrant Organization:Richardson Consulting, LLC
Registrant Street1:1350 Beverly Rd.
Registrant Street2:#115-456
Registrant Street3:
Registrant City:McLean
Registrant State/Province:Virginia
Registrant Postal Code:22101
Registrant Country:US
Registrant Phone:+1.7039815553
Registrant Phone Ext.:
Registrant FAX:
Registrant FAX Ext.:
Registrant Email:craigr@richardson-consulting.com}:
eelegal.org/
... Agency's Regulation of Selenium Used in its Ongoing “War On Coal” ... E&E Legal Letters Issue IV: Demanding Transparency: It's Not Just for Obama Haters Anymore ... by The Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal) and the Free Market ... Chris Horner on Cavuto: Making renewable energy profitable not a ...
E&E Legal v. EPA
eelegal.org/?cat=51
Apr 3, 2014 - Daily Caller: Report: EPA coal plant rule tainted by secretiveness, ... Energy and Environmental Law Institute attorney Chris Horner has ...
Report: EPA coal plant rule tainted by secretiveness ...
dailycaller.com/.../report-epa-coal-plant-rule-tainted-by-...
The Daily Caller
Mar 10, 2014 - Energy and Environmental Law Institute attorney Chris Horner has presented an 81-page regulatory comment showing the EPA's “New Source ...
EPA accused of stonewalling records requests from ...[fee waiver?]
www.foxnews.com/.../epa-accused-stonewalling-recor...
Fox News Channel
Apr 2, 2014 - The Washington, D.C.-based Energy & Environment Legal Institute filed ... down coal in America,” said Chris Horner, the group's legal counsel.
Coal Q&A - EPA FOIA Findings and Implications for "the War ...
www.americancoalcouncil.org/.../event_details.as...
American Coal Council
Jul 23, 2014 - Christopher C. Horner, Energy & Environment Legal Institute and Senior Fellow, Competitive Enterprise Institute Wednesday, July 23, 2014 ...
Introducing The Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E ...
www.prnewswire.com/.../introducing-the-energy--environment-legal-inst...
Oct 3, 2013 - Horner, a national leader in transparency cases, and the one who discovered ... The Energy and Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal) is a ...
Legality of EPA Rules Questioned by Environmental Litigators
www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/EPA-coal.../561045/
Newsmax Media
Mar 21, 2014 - Environmental Protection Agency regulations on coal emissions are ... Horner's complaint relies in part on EPA officials' emails obtained in his capacity as a senior legal fellow at the Energy & Environmental Legal Institute, ...
Is the EPA in bed with environmental groups? You decide ...
americanminingrights.com/is-the-epa-in-bed-with-environmental-groups...
Jan 22, 2014 - Emails show cozy relationship between EPA, environmental groups ... Act request by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute. ... Emails previously obtained by Horner's group reveal similar agenda-sharing regarding coal.
EPA Worked With Enviro Groups to Kill Keystone XL Pipeline
www.thenewamerican.com/.../environment/.../17463-epa-worked-with-e...
Jan 23, 2014 - Chris Horner of the Energy and Environment Legal Institute asserts that as a ... Dozens of e-mail exchanges regarding coal and the regulations ...
Report: EPA coal plant rule tainted by secretiveness ...
www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3131542/posts
Free Republic
Mar 10, 2014 - Energy and Environmental Law Institute attorney Chris Horner has ... which limits carbon emissions from new coal plants — was developed by ...
==
some hypocrisy re cheney secret task force?
BS
:{**:{CEI Files Lawsuit against Office of Science and Technology Policy:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:(style="font-style:normal"):}:
By :{:{:{Hans Bader:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: • May 5, 2014
Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute :{**:{sued:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:(style="font-style:normal"):}: the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) for :{**:{flouting:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:(style="font-style:normal"):}: the Freedom of Information Act. CEI's Chris Horner asked OSTP to produce work-related emails that OSTP's Director, John Holdren, stored in an email account at his former employer, the environmental-pressure group Woods Hole Research Center.
OSTP has resisted producing them. (The use of such non-official accounts for agency business frustrates federal open-government laws, and undermines government accountability, since such accounts are generally not searched in response to FOIA or congressional oversight requests seeking work-related communications or agency records. Moreover, the use of email accounts at a former employer that lobbies the federal government gives such pressure groups direct access to and control over public records, including highly sensitive information.)
What is ironic about this is that OSTP's Director, soon after taking office, lectured OSTP employees about not conducting official business using private email accounts, and about the need to forward all work-related communications to their agency email account in order to comply with federal record-keeping laws. (See May 10, 2010 Memo from OSTP Director John Holdren to all OSTP staff, Subject: Reminder: Compliance with the Federal Records Act and the President’s Ethics Pledge, at 1, available as Exhibit B to the letter :{:{:{at this link:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}:.) Apparently, the longer an official is in power, and the less he fears losing power, the less he cares about government transparency and the rule of law.
Meanwhile, OSTP has thumbed its nose at CEI's :{:{:{request under the Information Quality Act:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: that it correct OSTP Director John Holdren's notoriously :{:{:{false:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: :{:{:{claim:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}:,:{:{:{criticized:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: or disagreed with by :{:{:{climate:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: :{:{:{scientists:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}:, :{:{:{that:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: global warming is :{:{:{leading to more severe cold weather:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}:. As of the time this blog post was published, OSTP's "Information Quality Guidelines" :{:{:{website:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::(style="font-style:normal"):}: continued to falsely claim that "OSTP has received no information quality correction requests. Any future requests will be posted on this page." It so claims even though CEI had submitted its most recent information quality request about a month ago (emailing it on April 13, and faxing it on April 14), and that same week, discussed that request by phone with an OSTP employee, who confirmed receipt of CEI's request, and stated that it would be posted on OSTP's web site.
OSTP made this false claim on its web site even though it was blatantly wrong at the time it was made: OSTP has received not one, but two CEI data quality correction requests, including a highly-publicized 2003 request that OSTP was sued over and resulted in a correction of OSTP's earlier climate change claims. See Chris Mooney, *:{:{Paralysis by Analysis:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:*: Jim Tozzi's Regulation to End All Regulation, Washington Monthly, May 1, 2004, at 23 ("Last August, the Competitive Enterprise Institute . . . filed suit under the Data Quality Act over a Clinton-era report on global warming, known as the National Assessment of Climate Change. Though the suit was ultimately settled out of court, government lawyers agreed to attach a disclaimer to the report.”).
OSTP's recent attempt to evade FOIA is equally disturbing. OSTP first claimed that CEI lawyer Chris Horner's FOIA request was not a FOIA request at all, even though it explicitly cited FOIA and FOIA statutory provisions and regulations. Then it interpreted Chris's request as covering only certain emails already found in Holdren's official OSTP email account. The latter contention tortured the English language, while its former contention was legally just wrong: judges have ruled that agencies have to produce records reflecting agency activities, even if they were “neither created by agency employees, nor . . . currently located on agency property." Burka v. HHS, 87 F.3d 508, 515 (D.C. Cir. 1996). Here, the records were exchanged with an agency employee -- indeed, the agency's director! -- and recent rulings affirm that FOIA can be used to request agency records, even when they are in an official's private email account. (See, e.g., Landmark Legal Foundation v. E.P.A., 2013 WL 4083285, *6 (D.D.C. Aug. 14, 2013) (refusing to dismiss a FOIA lawsuit, because EPA failed to search agency officials' personal email accounts); CEI v. EPA, No. 12-1617, 2014 WL 308093, at *14 (D.D.C. Jan. 29, 2014) (noting that a requester "can simply ask for work-related emails and agency records found in the specific employees’ personal accounts; requesters” need not even identify the non-official email addresses at issue, which requesters may not know)).
===
2020 Penn ave
ggle:
eelegal.org/wp-content/.../01/ATI-EPA-Sierra-Fee-Waiver-Appeal.pdf
mtcowgirl.com/.../in-spite-of-ruling-that-it-broke-montana-laws-sinruds-...
americantradition.org/methods/
americantradition.org/news-views/
americantradition.org/tag/keystone-delay/
- ### [[PDF]](https://www.google.com/search?es_sm=122&q=related:americantradition.org/tag/keystone-delay/+2020+Pennsylvania+Avenue,+NW+%23186&tbo=1&sa=X&ei=-_sNVIfMAuXK8gGT7IHQDw&ved=0CDwQHzAE):{:{ATI DoE Silver Appeal Constructive Denial - Energy :(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:**:{...:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
www.atinstitute.org/.../ATI_DoE_Silver_Appeal_Constructive_DenialRe...
cei.org/legal.../complaint-filed-cei-v-nsa
:{Competitive Enterprise Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- ### **:{[PDF]:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{:{FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT REQUEST May 18 :(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:**:{...:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
www.atinstitute.org/wp.../ATI_GMU_Wegman_ACLU_et_al_FOIA.pdf
- ### **:{[PDF]:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{:{Received - U.S. Copyright Office:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:
www.copyright.gov/.../american_partner....
:{United States Copyright Office:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- ### [[PDF]](https://www.google.com/search?es_sm=122&q=related:www.copyright.gov/onlinesp/agents/a/american_partner.pdf+2020+Pennsylvania+Avenue,+NW+%23186&tbo=1&sa=X&ei=-_sNVIfMAuXK8gGT7IHQDw&ved=0CFUQHzAI):{:{ATI Reply to U of A Production Indexes - Watts Up With That?:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:
wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/.../ati-reply-to-u-of-a-production-in...
**:{===:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
**:{Christopher C. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{ is an attorney in :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:Washington, D.C., a Senior Fellow at the :{Competitive Enterprise Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, and an outspoken skeptic of climate change. Horner is also the author of three books on :{climate change skepticism:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:.
Horner has represented CEI as well as Members of the U.S. House and Senate on matters of environmental policy in the federal courts, including the Supreme Court. He has written on numerous topics in publications such as law reviews, legal and industrial trade journals, and opinion pages. He is the author of four books.
- The Liberal War on Transparency (2012)
- Power Grab: How Obama's Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America (2010) perseus
- Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud, and Deception to Keep You Misinformed (2008) Regnery
- The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming (and Environmentalism)(2007) Regnery
The last was on the :{New York Times Bestseller list:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: for many weeks.
[amazon blurb: pwr grab
Christopher Horner, hailed by Glenn Beck as a “Watchdog” and praised by Rush Limbaugh as the “longtime go-to guy on global warming extremism,” has compiled a jaw-dropping account of the government’s arrogant plans to take over America’s access to abundant, afforable energy—and by doing so, take over our economy and limit the individual freedom we’ve so long taken for granted. http://www.amazon.com/Power-Grab-Policies-Freedom-Bankrupt/dp/1596985992 2010 Perseus/regnery]
[http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/nov/7/book-review-the-liberal-war-on-transparency/?page=all
BOOK REVIEW: ‘The Liberal War on Transparency’
By Ilya Shapiro and James Schindler - - Wednesday, November 7, 2012
:{THE LIBERAL WAR ON TRANSPARENCY: CONFESSIONS OF A FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ‘CRIMINAL’
By }::{Christopher C. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
Threshold Editions, $27, 283 pages [simon & shuster]
Reviewed By }::{Ilya Shapiro:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: and :{James Schindler:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
Transparency is demanded by those out of power and rejected by those in power. Witness President Obama, who ran as a transparency candidate in 2008 and then ran from transparency as president.
An intriguing and painstakingly in-depth glimpse into the hypocrisy of the Obama administration, “The Liberal War on Transparency: Confessions of a Freedom of Information ‘Criminal,’” catalogs the author’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) fiascos. In a rollicking tale of hilarious frustrations and disturbing government shenanigans, :{Christopher Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: shines the proverbial spotlight on some self-described spotlight-shiners who are anything but.
:{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute — a free-market think tank in Washington — recalls the history of the transparent-government movement, which was lauded by progressives such as Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis and President Franklin D. Roosevelt and codified in FOIA under Lyndon B. Johnson.
Likewise, modern liberals praise the “transparency” that resulted from sources such as WikiLeaks, the theft of official records relating especially to the Iraq War and Guantanamo Bay, calling it just the kind of openness needed for healthy government. :{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: emphasizes the existence of a double standard by journalists who believe that transparency is only useful for scrutinizing conservatives — even if it requires rummaging through their trash. But when it comes to gathering information from liberal politicians and left-wing causes, these erstwhile muckrakers find virtue in an ambiguous government.
The book recounts the start of Barack Obama’s term of office in 2009, when the president declared that his administration would be “the most transparent in history.” The White House even issued memos instructing agencies to err on the side of transparency in FOIA requests. It did not, however, take long for the other shoe to drop: Scandals, cover-ups and bad publicity necessitated less transparency, lost and destroyed records, and systematic circumvention of the law.
One agency :{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: repeatedly criticizes is the Environmental Protection Agency, whose officials were discovered using personal email accounts to conduct official business in order to avoid FOIA scrutiny. Carol Browner, former EPA administrator and later energy and environment “czar,” was caught having used two email accounts for her government work — one for “official” business, and the other for off-the-record business.
Similarly, the author chides the Department of Homeland Security, an agency that has been without an inspector general since January 2011, for prescreening FOIA requests for possible bad political implications. He decries the Department of Homeland Security’s front office for no longer using email, relying solely on in-person and telephone communication to avoid requestable written communication.
:{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: exposes the practice of White House staffers meeting with lobbyists in secrecy at a nearby row house to avoid official visitor record keeping. Other examples of situations where officials illegally delayed the release of FOIA-covered records (“lost” them or otherwise made them difficult to obtain by forcing researchers to seek court orders) is a list of the administration’s political dirty laundry: Fast and Furious, TARP, the BP oil spill, the GM and Chrysler bailouts, the National Labor Relations Board’s attack on Boeing, ACORN, czar appointees, recess appointments, cap and trade, the Keystone XL pipeline and Solyndra.
In contrast, certain FOIA requests for information politically favorable to the Obama administration achieved responses as quickly as the same day.
Among the worst FOIA abuses :{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: chronicles are those by NASA and taxpayer-funded university climate scientists [complete ass kicking in VA?] who routinely lost or destroyed important statistical records and used personal email accounts to thwart detailed investigations. Indeed, the word “criminal” in the book’s title refers to a speech by current EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, in which she asserted that using FOIA to seek records from government-funded scientists was “criminal.”
:{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: recalls President Eisenhower’s farewell address in which he warned not just of a growing military-industrial complex but of the unhealthy concentration of the nation’s scholars and scientists in federal employment. All the while, the media remain mostly silent, underscoring again the liberal double standard and undermining the nation’s trust in its educational institutions.
:{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: ends the book with a useful how-to guide for filing one’s own FOIA requests, chock-full of wisdom that comes only from years of trial, error and experience as an “information criminal.”
Overall, “The Liberal War on Transparency” is an easy, interesting read with only a few minor stylistic flaws. Sometimes in :{Mr. Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:’s desire to be comprehensive, for example, his anecdotes can be superfluous or overlong. It’s clear the author is an attorney from his occasional use of 10 words when two will do.
But those are just quibbles; this book provides vital information in a straightforward manner. It should be read by those who want to “speak truth to power” — and especially by those in power.
:{Ilya Shapiro:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: is a senior fellow in constitutional studies at the Cato Institute, where :{James Schindler:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: is a legal associate.
:{
Follow us: }::{@washtimes on Twitter:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
]
Horner has testifiedbefore the U.S. :{Senate Committee on Foreign Relations:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: and the :{Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, and works on a legal and policy level with numerous think tanks and policy organizations throughout the world. He has given numerous addresses to audiences in the :{European Parliament:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: in Strasbourg and Brussels, and before policymakers in European capitals including London, Rome, Prague, Copenhagen, Madrid, and Warsaw; topics range from rail deregulation and unfunded pension liability to energy and environment issues. He has provided legal, policy, and political commentary several hundred times each on both television and radio, in the United States, Europe, Canada, and Australia, including on the :{Fox News Channel:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{Court TV:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{MSNBC:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (with repeat visits on :{The News Hour with Jim Lehrer:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:), :{BBC:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{CNN:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{CNN International:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{ITN:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{CBC:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, :{Bloomberg:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:, and:{Reuters Television:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:.
Horner received his :{Juris Doctorate:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: from :{Washington University in St. Louis:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:.[[1]](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_C._Horner#cite_note-1)[[2]](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_C._Horner#cite_note-2)
Contents
:{ :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:[:{hide:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{] }:
- :{1 See also:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- :{2 Sources:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- :{3 External links:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
See also:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:[:{:{edit source:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{ | }::{:{editbeta:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{]}:
 | ***:{Global warming portal:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:*** |
- :{List of The Daily Show guests (2007):(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (interviewed about The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism)
:{
}:
Sources:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:[:{:{edit source:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{ | }::{:{editbeta:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{]}:
- :{New York Times Bestsellers: paperback nonfiction - 11 March 2007:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (first week on list)
- :{New York Times Bestsellers: paperback nonfiction - 07 October 2007:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (last week on list)
- :{Biography:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: at CEI
- Red Hot Lies (Washington D.C.: :{Regnery Publishing:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:) 2008 (includes summary biography)
- :{Statement Of Christopher C. Horner To The Joint Hearing Of The Senate Committees On Foreign Relations And Environment And Public Works:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: on the :{Kyoto Protocol:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (24 June 2002)
External links:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:[:{:{edit source:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{ | }::{:{editbeta:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}::{:{]}:
- :{Interview:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: on :{PBS Newshour:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (14 March 2001)
- :{Interview:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: on :{The Daily Show:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: about The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism (13 February 2007)
- :{Interview:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: in :{Spiked:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (November 2008)
- :{Interview:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: on :{Fox News:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: about Red Hot Lies (10 November 2008)
- [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DW-pMcf6WX8 book tv human events pal, sister co of regnery; plant cooler when b43 left office
- klaus; rich counties healthier and cleaner; make bangladesh rich so they can deal w/ hurricanes like florida does; bears pop up faster than ppl (10 of 13)
- anarctic cooling and ice growing; except the bit of underwater volcanoes; press gets pengins and polar bears backwards network
- ~AP makes stuff up
- 4th yr of cooling now; models wrong
- Red Hot Lies contends that, with a new administration, the global warming lobby is about to go into overdrive, forcing through new legislation that further weakens the U.S. economy. The author presents what he believes the global warming lobby is doing and saying to advance their agenda - and what conservatives must do to counter their arguments. Chris Horner is interviewed by Jed Babbin, Editor, Human Events
- review: http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=348
- drs for disater prep http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYgUvJr6BYI 70 mon sorta recent
:{References:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:[:{edit source:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{ | }::{editbeta:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{]}:
- Jump up
- Jump up
:{Categories:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::
- :{Environmental skepticism:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- :{Living people:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
- :{Washington University in St. Louis alumni:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
==
mirror/crypto:
FME Law seeks to provide a counter-weight to the litigious environmental movement that fosters an economically destructive regulatory regime in the United States. The environmental movement’s litigation strategy is particularly troublesome. Since the beginning of the movement in the 1970s, eight major litigating environmental organizations have filed more than 3,250 cases and EarthJustice alone has nearly 150 cases pending. Radical environmentalism has also taken over the classroom. The number of activist environmental law clinics – over 30. The number of free-market environmental law clinics – one, ours.
==
He has written on numerous topics in publications ranging from law reviews to legal and industrial trade journals to print and online opinion pages, and is the author of three best-selling books: Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America (Regnery, 2010); Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed (Regnery, 2008) and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism (Regnery, 2007), which spent half of 2007 on the New York Times bestseller list.
===
:{http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Christopher_C._Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
Attorney Christopher C. Horneris a senior fellow at the climate contrarian Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), a think tank that's received more than $2 million in funding from ExxonMobil since 1998, among other corporate funders. [1]
ALSO KOCH
Horner is also director of litigation at the contrarian **:{American Tradition Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**’s Environmental Law Center,[2] although according to the ATI's 2010 IRS Form 990, this position is unpaid.[5] (A 2011 IRS Form 990 filing has not yet been located for ATI's sister 501(c)(4), American Tradition Partnership.[3])
Contents [hide] |
Background
According to his CEI bio, Horner received his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis.
Climate expertise unclear
It is unclear what expertise Mr. Horner has acquired that makes him more qualified to assess climate science than 97% of actively publishing climate scientists.
:{
}:
CEI duties
Horner is a practicing attorney, and at CEI "oversees petitions and litigation on topics including data access and quality laws, the Freedom of Information Act, and government science and agency statutory compliance, and other legal matters involving environment and energy issues, international environmental treaties, and climate policy." [4] His CEI duties also include being counsel to the Cooler Heads Coalition, a global warming skeptics group. He "works on a legal and policy level with numerous think tanks and policy organizations throughout the world," according to his profile on the CEI site. [5] Horner is a speaker at the Heartland Institute's Sixth International Conference on Climate Change [6]
:{
}:
Action
On global warming
Horner is a speaker at the International Conference on Climate Change (2009) organized by the Heartland Institute think tank. [7]
Horner has authored two books, through Regnery Publishing: "Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed" (2008) and "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism" (2007). [5]
Horner has accused NASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe." Horner told Fox News that Hansen has "clearly abused his platform provided to him by the taxpayer, principally by the way he's been exposed of manipulating and revising data with the strange coincidence of him always found on the side of exaggerating the warming." [8]
The inside flap of Horner's book "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism" states that "for decades, environmentalism has been the Left's best excuse for increasing government control over our actionsin ways both large and small.It's for Mother Earth! It's for the children! It's for the whales! But until now, the doomsday-scenario environmental scares they've trumped up haven't been large enough to justify the lifestyle restrictions they want to impose. With global warming, however, greenhouse gasbags can argue that auto emissions in Ohio threaten people in Paris,and that only 'global governance' (Jacques Chirac's words) [French, thus prolly commie?] can tackle such problems." [6]
On September 13, 2007, Horner commented on the rapid loss of Arctic sea ice, on Fox News 13. Horner questioned the claim that the opening of the Northwest Passage was new, because the NASA data was based only on the satellite record available since 1972, and noted that Raould Amundsen crossed it in 1905. In fact, Amundsen, the first person in history to cross the passage, picked his way through the ice in a small Norwegian Arctic fishing boat. His route closely hugged the Canadian coast. In contrast sea ice loss is most obvious on the other side of the Arctic Ocean. Since 1979 an area of ice comprising almost half of the Arctic between Siberia and Greenland became open water. [9]
Despite making frequent contributions to Fox News with his expert opinion,neither of his profile pages on the Heartland Institute website nor the Competitive Enterprise Institute website list any scientific qualifications whatsoever[10][11]
Quotations
"[The planet Pluto, which is warming up despite moving away from the sun], is a reminder that no matter where you are climate happens... There will be inevitably and likely imminent claims [by environmentalists] that mankind is also causing Plutonian global warming." [7]
Articles and resources
Related SourceWatch articles
- Global warming skeptics
- Heartland Institute
- International Conference on Climate Change (2009)
- SourceWatch:Project:Creating Articles on Sponsors and Speakers at The 2008 International Conference on Climate Change
- Competitive Enterprise Institute
- Frontiers of Freedom
- American Tradition Institute
:{
}:
References
- ↑ "Factsheet: Competitive Enterprise Institute," ExxonSecrets.org, accessed March 2009.
- ↑ "[1]"
- ↑ ahaynes, 2011-11-08
- ↑ "Personnel details: Chris Horner," Heartland Institute website, accessed March 2009.
- ↑ 5.0^(http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Chris_Horner#cite_ref-CEIbio_4-0) 5.1^(http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Chris_Horner#cite_ref-CEIbio_4-1)"Christopher C. Horner," Competitive Enterprise Institute website, accessed March 2009.
- ↑ "[2]"
- ↑ "Speakers," Heartland Institute website, accessed January 2009.
- ↑ "Fox News: NASA's Chief Climate Scientist Stirs Controversy with Call for Civil Disobedience]," States News Service, February 26, 2009.
- ↑
," CEI channel on YouTube.com, September 13, 2007. - ↑ "[3]"
- ↑ "[4]"
:{
}:
External resources
- Profile on Heatland Institute http://heartland.org/chris-horner
- Profile on Competitve Enterprise Institute site http://cei.org/expert/christopher-c-horner
External articles
Articles and Presentations by Horner
- :{Chris Horner, :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:[http://www.heartland.org/bin/media/newyork09/PowerPoint/Chris_Horner.ppt "Re-Writing the Rules for Kyoto II: Turning a Treaty into a Congressional-Executive Agreement ", Presentation to the Heartland Institute's International Conference on Climate Change (2009), March 9, 2009. (PowerPoint)
Categories: Climate change | Global warming skeptics | People
----
desmog: http://www.desmogblog.com/chris-horner
Chris Horner
Credentials
- Juris Doctorate from Washington University in St. Louis. [1]
Background
Christopher C. Horner is a senior fellow the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), a Washington, DC-based think-tank. He is also the director of litigation at the American Tradition Institute’s Environmental Law Center.
Horner is a lawyer by training and regularly appears on television as a commentator on the issue of climate change.
Stance on Climate Change
"Given that the atmosphere inarguably shows no appreciable warming in the 25-year history of satellite and radiosonde measurements (initiated in response to the cooling panic), to assert that runaway global warming is as real as President Bush's re-election is an absurd proposition." [2]
Key Quotes
"Pluto's warm-up is a reminder that no matter where you are climate happens. It always has, it always will — with or without SUVs. And it should remind us to continue taking with an ever-increasing grain of salt these claims that your car acts as a weather machine." [3]
Key Deeds
June 30 - July 1, 2011:{
Horner spoke at the Heartland Institute's Sixth International Conference on Climate Change. [4] His presentation was titled }:"Crony Capitalism and the 'Green Jobs' Charade."[solydra?]:{
DeSmogBlog found that 17 of the 43 sponsors of the }:Heartland Institute’s Sixth International Conferenceon Climate Change, including the Heartland Institute itself, have collectively received over $46 million from either Scaife Foundations, Koch Foundations, or ExxonMobil and its foundation.
March 8-10, 2009
Horner was a speaker at theHeartland Institute's 2009 International Conference on Climate Change. The conference is described as "a platform for scientists and policy analysts from around the world who question the theory that global warming is a crisis." [4]
His presentation was titled "Re-Writing the Roles for Kyoto II: Turning a Treaty into a Congressional-executive Agreement"
DeSmogBlog found that organizations sponsoring the conference had collectively received over $40 million from oil companies and right-wing foundations such as Koch Foundations and Scaife Foundations.
February 27, 2009
Horner accused NASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe."
Horner stated that Hansen had "clearly abused his platform provided to him by the taxpayer, principally by the way he's been exposed of manipulating and revising data with the strange coincidence of him always found on the side of exaggerating the warming." [5]
2009:{
Participated in the "Climate Chains" video along with fellow climate change skeptics Myron Ebell, Marlo Lewis, Patrick Michaels, and Todd Wynn. The video claims that "One of the greatest threats to freedom and prosperity in America is climate change legislation." The video was organized by the Cascade Policy Institute. [6]}:
March 2 - 4, 2008:{
Horner spoke at the Heartland Institute's First International Conference on Climate Change. The purpose of this conference was reported to be to "generate international media attention" on global warming skepticism. [4]}:
May 2, 2007:{
Appeared on Glenn Beck's May 2, 2007 special "Exposed: The Climate of Fear."}:
Affiliations
- :{Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI):(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Senior Fellow, Center for Energy and Environment. [1]
- :{American Tradition Institute :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— "Senior Director of Litigation." [7]
- :{Cooler Heads Coalition:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Oversees petitions and litigation for the Cooler Heads Coalition in "environment and energy issues, international environmental treaties, and climate policy." [8] Also listed as a "Contributor." [9]
- :{Tech Central Station :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Contributor. [10]
- :{Enron Corporation :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Past director of Federal Government Relations (1997).[11]
- :{National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA):(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Contributor. [11]
- :{European Enterprise Institute :(style="background:#ffffff"):}:— Past Director of External Relations, Policy Counsel. [12]
Publications
Horner has written two books published through Regnery Publishing::{Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:(2008) and :{The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism:(style="background:#ffffff"):}: (2007).
According to a search of Google Scholar, Horner has not published any peer-reviewed articles on the subject of climate change.
Resources
- "Christopher C. Horner," Competitive Enterprise Institute. Accessed January, 2012.
- Christopher C. Horner. "Reviving 'Global Warming'," letter in the Washington Times. Republished by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, April 29, 2005.
- Marc Morano. "'Alarmist' Global Warming Claims Unfounded Says Climatolgist," CNSNews.com, July 14, 2003. Archived March 13, 2008.
- "Chris Horner," International Conference on Climate Change, accessed January, 2012.
- "NASA's Chief Climate Scientist Stirs Controversy With Call for Civil Disobedience," FoxNews.com, February 27, 2009.
- "About the Experts," ClimateChains.com. Archived April 1, 2010.
- "Court Orders University of Virginia to Produce Documents of Dr. Michael Mann" (Press Release), American Tradition Institute, May 25, 2011.
- ExxonSecrets Factsheet: Christopher C. Horner.
- "Contributors," Globalwarming.org. Accessed January, 2012.
- "Christopher C. Horner," Tech Central Station. Archived February 8, 2005.
- "Christopher C. Horner," Profile at the National Center for Policy Analysis. Accessed January, 2011.
- "Executive," European Enterprise Institute. Archived January 6, 2009.
- "Chris Horner," SourceWatch Profile.
:{http://www.desmogblog.com/chris-horner
}:
_
exxonsecrets
Director of litigation at the American Tradition Institute's Environmental Law Center:{
}:-Counsel, Cooler Heads Coalition -Adjunct Fellow, Frontiers of Freedom -CEI Senior Fellow -Senior Fellow, Center for Energy and Environment:{
Horner oversees petitions and litigation for the Cooler Heads Coalition, specifically regarding "environment and energy issues, international environmental treaties, and climate policy". He has been particularly vocal in arguing that the National Assessment on Climate Change was illegally produced. He has previously been a guest columnist for Tech Central Station.
As a senior fellow at CEI, Horner oversees petitions and litigation on topics including the Freedom of Information Act, government science and agency statutory compliance, environment and energy issues, international environmental treaties, and climate policy. According to his CEI profile, he “works on a legal and policy level with numerous think tanks and policy organizations throughout the world.”
Graduate of the Law School at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.}:
QUOTES
If history has taught us anything it’s to listen to that one crazy German. http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-february-13-2007/christopher-horner :{
Source: }::{Daily Show - Chris Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Pluto's warm-up [despite moving away from the sun] is a reminder that no matter where you are climate happens. It always has, it always will -- with or without SUVs. And it should remind us to continue taking with an ever-increasing grain of salt these claims that your car acts as a weather machine… There will be inevitably and likely imminent claims that mankind is also causing Plutonian global warming. http://www.cnsnews.com/node/5679 :{
Source: }::{cnsnews:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
KEY DEEDS
8 February, 2007
:{
Author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming (and Environmentalism)" released February 2007 by Regnery Publishing Inc. The book's inside flap explains that Horner "lays out incontrovertible evidence for the fact that catastrophic man-made global warming is just more Chicken-Little hysteria, not actual science. He explains why, although Al Gore and his cronies among the media elites and UN globalists endlessly bleat that "global warming" is an unprecedented global crisis, they really think of it as a dream come true. It's the ideal scare campaign for those who hate capitalism and love big government. For, as Horner explains, if global warming really were as bad as the Leftist doomsayers insist it is, then no policy imaginable could "solve" it. According to the logic of the greens' own numbers, no matter how much we sacrifice there would still be more to do. That makes global warming the bottomless well of excuses for the relentless growth of big government."
Source: }::{Amazon.com Horner Book Page 2007:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
2 May, 2007
Appeared on Glenn Beck's May 2, 2007 special "Exposed: The Climate of Fear"
DEEDS
:{16 December, 2004
Horner wrote "Who's The Greatest? Climate change is the 'greatest threat'... except for all the others." for Tech Central Station 12/16/05
Source: }::{Tech Central Station article - Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
Participated in the "Climate Chains" video along with Myron Ebell Marlo Lewis, Patrick Micheals, and Todd Wynn. The video claims that “One of the greatest threats to freedom and prosperity in America is climate change legislation.”
Source: }::{Climate Chains bios:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
Author, Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep you Misinformed (2008)
In May 2011, Horner asked the University of Virginia for access to thousands of e-mails and documents by Michael Mann who had left the university several years earlier. The request, backed by the Freedom of Information Act, was on behalf of the American Tradition Institute. The Washington Post reported the issue on June 3 in the opinion spread, criticizing Horner as one of “some global warming skeptics in Virginia are showing that even the best tools (the Freedom of Information Act) can be misused.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harassing-climate-change-researchers/2011/05/27/AG1xJMEH_story.html
Source: }::{Washington Post Chris Horner Op-Ed:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
Horner has accused NASA's chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of "doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe." Horner stated that Hansen had "clearly abused his platform provided to him by the taxpayer, principally by the way he's been exposed of manipulating and revising data with the strange coincidence of him always found on the side of exaggerating the warming."
Source: }::{DeSmogBlog profile Chris Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
KEY EVENTS
Experts Discuss Why United States Should Withdraw Its Signature From Kyoto; Whatever Happened To Global Warming Anyway?:{
}::{http://www.usnewswire.com/topnews/first/0514-108.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
The relationship of Christopher C. Horner to the event: Speaker}:
EVENTS
Heartland Climate Conference 6:{
}::{http://climateconference.heartland.org/about-2/speakers/:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
The relationship of Christopher C. Horner to the event: speaker}:
ORGANIZATIONS
**:{Competitive Enterprise Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{CEI website, 3/04:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{Heartland Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{Heartland 2010 Climate Conference Speaker List:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{Frontiers of Freedom Institute and Foundation:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{Frontiers of Freedom website 5-06:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{National Center for Policy Analysis:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{NCPA website 4/04:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{Tech Central Science Foundation or Tech Central Station:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{Tech Central Station Bio - Horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{European Enterprise Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{European Enterprise Institute Website (2006):(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{Cooler Heads Coalition:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{Capitalism Magazine:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:**:{Cascade Policy Institute:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**:{
Source: }::{Climate Chains homepage:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
SOURCES
CEI website, 3/04:{
}::{http://www.cei.org:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:NCPA website 4/04:{
}::{http://www.ncpa.org/:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Tech Central Station Bio - Horner:{
}::{http://www.techcentralstation.com/biohornerchristopher.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Tech Central Station article - Horner:{
}::{http://www.techcentralstation.com/121604E.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Frontiers of Freedom website 5-06:{
}::{http://www.ff.org:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:European Enterprise Institute Website (2006):{
}::{http://www.european-enterprise.org/items/executive/:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Capitalism Magazine:{
}::{http://www.capmag.com/author.asp?name=229:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Amazon.com Horner Book Page 2007:{
}:CNN, Glenn Beck special "Exposed: The Climate of Fear," May 2, 2007:{
}::{http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/beck.climateoffear/:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Heartland 2010 Climate Conference Speaker List:{
More than 70 speakers will make keynote presentations or participate in panel discussions at the Fourth International Conference on Climate Change, May 16-18, 2010 in Chicago.
}::{http://www.heartland.org/events/2010Chicago/speakers.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Climate Chains bios:{
}::{http://http://www.climatechains.com/bios.html:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Climate Chains homepage:{
}::{http://www.climatechains.com/:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::{
}:Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud, and Deception to Keep You Misinformed:{
}:Daily Show - Chris Horner:{
}:cnsnews:{
}:Washington Post Chris Horner Op-Ed:{
}:DeSmogBlog profile Chris Horner:{
}::{http://www.desmogblog.com/chris-horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
:{http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=281:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
===
Am Trad Inst!lawsuit ~ Mann
---
:{regnery red hot lies http://www.amazon.com/Red-Hot-Lies-Alarmists-Misinformed/dp/product-description/1596985380
}:
----
see mashey?
---
Horner CEI atack Hansen and blogger http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/06/28/253240/fox-news-james-hansen/
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/06/28/253240/fox-news-james-hansen/
The latest effort is this lawsuit by Christopher Horner (of the American Tradition Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute), which is debunked here (and below). This smearing of scientists is what Horner does for a living (see Inhofe, Horner, McIntyre and Watts fabricate another phony “despicable smear” against Michael Mann).
Before discussing Horner’s disingenuous and self-contradictory attack, let me reprint a couple of statements by Hansen on the general subject of this sort of harassment (since I’m sure NASA’s attorney has asked that he not comment publicly on this lawsuit). Back in December 2009 Hansen explained the harassment strategy of the deniers here:
“I am now inundated with broad FOIA requests for my correspondence, with substantial impact on my time and on others in my office. I believe these to be fishing expeditions, aimed at finding some statement(s), likely to be taken out of context, which they would attempt to use to discredit climate science…. The input data for global temperature analyses are widely available, on our web site and elsewhere. If those input data could be made to yield a significantly different global temperature change, contrarians would certainly have done that — but they have not.”...
m on Jun 28, 2011 at 5:39 pm
NASA’s James Hansen is our leading climatologist and a modern day Paul Revere, if anyone were listening. He has been right longer about the dangers of unrestricted emissions of greenhouse gases than almost anybody (see “1981 Hansen study finds warming trend that could raise sea levels“).
So it’s no surprise that organizations around the world have given him prestigious awards — that include a substantial amount of money — which he is legally allowed to receive as a government employee. It’s also no surprise that the head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies is the subject of lawsuits and smears by the fossil-fuel-funded anti-science deniers who want unrestricted pollution, whose efforts, if successful, would doom billions to a ruined climate.
The latest effort is this lawsuit by Christopher Horner (of the American Tradition Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute), which is debunked here (and below). This smearing of scientists is what Horner does for a living (see Inhofe, Horner, McIntyre and Watts fabricate another phony “despicable smear” against Michael Mann).
Before discussing Horner’s disingenuous and self-contradictory attack, let me reprint a couple of statements by Hansen on the general subject of this sort of harassment (since I’m sure NASA’s attorney has asked that he not comment publicly on this lawsuit). Back in December 2009 Hansen explained the harassment strategy of the deniers here:
“I am now inundated with broad FOIA requests for my correspondence, with substantial impact on my time and on others in my office. I believe these to be fishing expeditions, aimed at finding some statement(s), likely to be taken out of context, which they would attempt to use to discredit climate science…. The input data for global temperature analyses are widely available, on our web site and elsewhere. If those input data could be made to yield a significantly different global temperature change, contrarians would certainly have done that — but they have not.”
More recently, in his open letter to the Prime Minister of New Zealand, he had this sardonic footnote to the deniers that harass him with e-mails:
Note to the people who send me messages (SOMETIMES SHOUTING IN ALL CAPS) demanding that I stop wasting THEIR MONEY and get out of the government: When I was in New Zealand I was on vacation, using up time accumulated years ago when I seldom took vacation. By taking the New Zealand vacation I am reducing taxpayers’ costs, because I would otherwise be paid (when I retire) a lump sum for the vacation days that I did not use. Your blood pressure might come down a notch further if you saw the nature of the “vacation”: slave-driver Jeanette Fitzsimons unceremoniously routing me out of bed at 6 or 7 AM every day to get moving to the next town – not exactly a case of sipping pina colada on a beach.
BTW, do you really believe that scientists make up or exaggerate global warming to get research funds? Our salaries do not depend on how much research the government funds. Government scientists get paid for working 40 hours a week, regardless of how long they work. My wife claims it is about 90 hours a week, but I say about 80. If you succeed in getting the government to cut back on science, because you don’t like the results, the main effect will be erosion of our competiveness relative to other nations. Your hounding of scientists does not bother me, but it may discourage young people from entering the profession, contributing to a national spiral into second or third rate technical and economic status. Perhaps, instead of questioning the motives of scientists, you should turn around and check the interests (motives) of the people who have pushed you to become so agitated.
This would be funny if cyber-bullying were not so serious (see “UK Guardian slams Morano for cyber-bullying and for urging violence against climate scientists“).
Indeed, one of the core strategies of the climate science deniers is to promote the laughable notion that workaholic scientists like Hansen are ‘in it for the money’ – when anyone who knows real scientists understands that this isn’t the profession anyone goes into to make money.
And that brings us back to the latest smear by the deniers against Hansen. You can see the smear here:
It was thoroughly debunked by a post from Climate Science FOI (Freedom of Information) Report, which I reprint here:
On the heels of its failed appeal to NASA on the issue of James Hansen’s ‘Permission to engage in outside activity’ forms, ATI’s Christopher Horner has filed suit against NASAin DC District Court:
:{ATI NASA Hansen FOIA lawsuit:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:
This lawsuit is notable for a number of misleading claims and for the argument that Horner is pursuing which is in complete opposition to the argument Horner pursued (wearing his CEI hat) in his other NASA FOIA lawsuit.
:{
}:
[OMG archive of foias: http://climscifoi.blogspot.com/2010/07/cei-and-nasa-lawsuit-ongoing.html
The technical issue at stake in the original ATI FOIA request is whether forms filled out by NASA employees to request permission to undertake outside activity fall under the FOIA exemption for personnel matters. Since it is clear that the requests are for non-official activity (by definition), and that federal employees have an expectation of privacy for non-official activities, the terms for the privacy exemption would clearly seem to be met.
This can be overridden with a strong enough ‘public interest’ which can be weighed against the privacy rights of the individual. However, in order to demonstrate a ‘public interest’ (note this is not the same as whether a member of the public is interested), Horner has brought up a number of tangential, irrelevant and just plain false accusations against Hansen, both in the lawsuit and in the commentary he has published online. Without a clear argument that there is a real issue with respect to NASA compliance with ethics rules, the public interest test is unlikely to be met.
A few examples: Horner accuses Hansen of receiving $1.2 million in outside income for work done as a federal employee. He does not note in the commentary (though it is stated in the lawsuit), that most of these monies were for international prize awards which, like a Nobel Prize, can be accepted by federal employees and do not count as ‘outside activity’ for which permission must be sought. The relevent federal ethics guidelines are quite explicit (see part d.1, and example 1). The four prizes in question (the Blue Planet Prize $550,000, the Heinz award $250,000, the Dan David award ($333,000?) and the Sophie Prize, $100,000) are all examples of an
:{… award … made as part of an established program of recognition:
(i) Under which awards have been made on a regular basis or which is funded, wholly or in part, to ensure its continuation on a regular basis; and
(ii) Under which selection of award recipients is made pursuant to written standards.}:
for which no prior permission is required.
Thus the insinuation that Hansen might not have complied with ethics guidelines by not filing ‘Outside activity’ forms for these prizes (which are not required) is clearly misleading (forms would have been required for speaking engagements and the like which apparently total to only $48,000 over 4 years).
Similarly, the claim in the lawsuit that Hansen received $720,000 from George Soros is simply fictitious. http://grist.org/article/more-swiftboating-of-james-hansen/
That link is to debunking by Hansen of the $720,000 smear that I posted 4 years ago (!) — see More swiftboating of James Hansen.
Even more curious is the use by Horner of documents produced by NASA in the CEI case (for which Horner is the lead attorney). These consist of some “Outside activity” forms from Gavin Schmidt, specifically one related to his activity on the RealClimate blog (see the filings in this case for more details). These forms were released in court filings, not through a FOIA request, and so do not have any relevance for determining whether there is a statutory right to see these forms via FOIA.
The issue in question in the CEI vs NASA case is whether blogging was part of Schmidt’s official duties (NASAsays it was not, while CEI is arguing the opposite). However in this case, Horner is arguing that for the period prior to the filing of Schmidt’s “Outside activity” form, Schmidt (and GISS) were out of compliance with ethics rules (which GISS and Schmidt have denied). For this to be the case though, one must at minimum accept that the RealClimate blogging was indeed not part of Schmidt’s official duties (if it was part of his official duties, then obviously he could not be out of compliance with ethics guidelines related to ‘outside activities’!). Thus, should this example be taken as evidence of NASA failing to uphold ethics rules, it would immediately undermine the argument put forward by Horner in the CEI case (that the RealClimate blogging was an official duty).
Having the same lawyer use two contradictory arguments in separate lawsuits against the same agency might be a sight to behold. One wonders if the judges will be impressed.
Hansen deserves every award that he wins, while the deniers deserve eternal shame for their ultimately self-destructive quest to block all serious efforts to preserve a livable climate.
Related Post:
- > NASA’s James Hansen on hacked emails: “The contrarians or deniers do not have a scientific leg to stand on. Their aim is to win a public relations battle, or at least get a draw, which may be enough to stymie the actions that are needed to stabilize climate.”
- > Competitive Enterprise Institute to sue RealClimate blogger over moderation policy
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MORE SWIFTBOATING OF JAMES HANSEN
Hansen’s response to a claim that he accepted money from George Soros By Joseph Romm 3 Oct 2007
I don’t know how NASA’s James Hansen keeps up his pace of writing — or how he puts up with the steady stream of disinformation launched against him. I am not trying to create a cult of personality around him, but I do feel under some obligation to give his writing as much attention as possible — as I think he has done more than any other scientist to raise awareness on climate change, and deserves our thanks, not slander.
“The latest swift-boating,” Hansen explains in a new post (PDF), “is the whacko claim that I received $720,000.00 from George Soros.” Here is a smear from*Investors Business Daily*, of all places — I have no idea why investors would be interested in such drivel — which migrated over to the conservative websight NewsBusters in an article titled, “Is Global Warming Alarmist James Hansen a Shill for George Soros?“
Hansen explains, “Here is the real deal, with the order of things, as well as I can remember without wasting even more time digging into papers and records”:
Sometime after giving a potentially provocative interview to Sixty Minutes, but before it aired, I tried to get legal advice on my rights of free speech. I made two or three attempts to contact people at Freedom Forum, who I had given permission to use a quote (something like “in my thirty-some years in the government, I have never seen anything like the present restrictions on the flow of information from scientists to the public”) on their calendar. I wanted to know where I could get, preferably inexpensive, legal advice. Never got a reply.
But then I received a call from the President of the Government Accountability Project (GAP) telling me that I had won the Ridenaur Award (including a moderate amount of cash — $10,000 I believe; the award is named for the guy who exposed the Viet Nam My Lai massacre), and offering pro bono legal advice. I agreed to accept the latter (temporarily), signing something to let them represent me (which had an escape clause that I later exercised).
I started to get the feeling that there may be expectations (strings) coming with the award, and I was concerned that it may create the appearance that I had spoken out about government censorship for the sake of the $. So I called the President of GAP, asking how the nomination process worked and who made the selection. He mentioned that he either nominated or selected me. So I declined the award, but I continued to accept pro bono legal advice for a while.
The principal thing that they provided was the attached letter to NASA. This letter shows me why scientists drive 1995 Hondas and lawyers drive Mercedes. I have a feeling that the reader of that letter had at least one extra gulp of coffee that morning.
But it turns out that GAP has lost most of their cases in defending whistle-blowers. It is obviously not because they are crummy lawyers. Things are getting pretty tough in our country. It is still not clear to me what rights of free speech we actually have today. Some people think that things must have changed in our government, since I have been speaking pretty freely of late. That is mainly appearance. The (free speech) situation in NASA is good at the moment only because our Administrator made a strong statement. The rules as written, according to GAP, will allow the next Administrator, if he so desires, to hammer the free speaker. But the big problem is that the Offices of Public Affairs in most agencies, at the Headquarters level, have been staffed with political appointees, who in effect are running Offices of Propaganda (Mark Bowen has written a book about this, which will come out in December). Public Affairs people at the field centers are dedicated professionals, but political appointees occupy the Headquarters positions in Washington. I complained about this to a Government Reform committee in the House, saying that there should be a law that Public Affairs must be staffed by professional civil servants, not political appointees. I did not seem to raise much interest. Too much reform for a Reform committee, I guess.
The bottom line is: I did not receive one thin dime from George Soros. Perhaps GAP did, but I would be surprised if they got $720,000 (that’s a lot of Mercedes). Whatever amount they got, I do not see anything wrong with it. They are a non-profit organization. Seems like a great idea to have some good lawyers trying to protect free speech.
By the way, in case anybody finds out that George Soros INTENDED to send me $720,000 but could not find my address, please let me know! We are pretty hard pressed here.
I’m glad he has kept his sense of humor.
I would also add that Hansen can speak fairly freely because he is high-profile and would be impossible to fire. But there are countless government scientists who are not in his position, who have been successfully muzzled (here, here, and here).
This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
==
ref'd above:
:{:{Inhofe, Horner, McIntyre and Watts fabricate another phony “despicable smear” against Michael Mann:(style="background:#ffffff"):}::(style="font-weight:normal"):}:
BY **:{JOE ROMM:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:** POSTED ON MARCH 9, 2011 AT 2:41 PM UPDATED: MARCH 20, 2011 AT 10:04 PM
on of their falsehoods [so far the answer is no]. I have Mann’s response at the end.
Last month we saw the umpteenth exhaustive investigation of the stolen emails that ended up vindicating the science and the scientists, this time by NOAA’s IG. “Inspector General’s Review of Stolen Emails Confirms No Evidence of Wrong-Doing by NOAA Climate Scientists,” as NOAA’s release put it.
A bunch of widely discredited pro-pollution scientist-smearers — Anthony “shout them down” Watts, Chris Horner, Marc Morano, Steve McIntyre — have spun a partially leaked transcript from the IG investigation into a bunch of libelous falsehoods. Sen. Inhofe has now reposted those stories on the Senate EPW website (here). The most plausible theory is that Inhofe himself leaked the information to right-wing fabricators so he could quote those stories (see below).
Sadly, no maat the whole point of their smears is to distract attention from the science, specifically the increasingly strong scientific vindication of Mann’s original Hockey Stick analysis. Multiple independent analyses reveal that recent warming is unprecedented in magnitude and speed and cause. The rate of human-driven warming in the last century has exceeded the rate of the underlying natural trend by more than a factor of 10, possibly much more. And warming this century on our current path of unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions is projected to cause a rate of warming that is another factor of 5 or moregreater than that of the last century. As WAG notes, within a few decades, nobody is going to be talking about hockey sticks, they will be talking about right angles (or hockey skates, see figure above) “” when they are done cursing our greed and myopia and gullibility in the face of polluter-funded disinformation, that is.
“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” “” Mark Twain
That’s how Prof. Scott Mandia begins his post, “Lie by Usual Suspects Traveling Around the World – Demand Retraction,” which I will excerpt below.
Michcomment from Dr. Mann became a NOAA employee in August 2008.
The emails I deleted while a university employee are the correspondence I had with Dr. Briffa of CRU regarding the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, all of which have been in the public domain since the CRU hack in November 2009. This correspondence has been extensively examined and no misconduct found. As a NOAA employee, I follow agency record retention policies and associated guidance from information technology staff.
Dr. Eugene R. Wahl
March 9, 2011
Mandia runs through the false statements, insinuations, and smears (you can go tohis website for all the links if you really want to subject yourself to the original, defamatory posts):
Anthony Watts has this post written by Steven Mosher highlighted on his blog:
“Sources confirm that a federal inspector has questioned Eugene Wahl and Wahl has confirmed that Mann asked him to delete emails. Wahl has also informed the inspector that he did delete emails as the result of this request.”
Flat-out untrue and Mosher has shown no evidence to support that claim. Mosher, in that same blog post, shows the excerpt from the Penn State investigation that was also featured by Chris Horner. That excerpt reveals that Dr. Mann said he did not delete emails. So, Steven Mosher, which is it? Are you lying or can you not read your own writing?
Watts actually put a note atop this Tuesday post, “Note: this will be a ‘top post’ for a day or two.” This is precisely his idea of a ‘top’ post.
Anthony Watts has perhaps more than any other leading anti-science blogger, viciously smeared scientists and urged his readers to do the same (see Watts urges WattsUpWithThat readers to disrupt Forbes blog: “shout them down in the comments section”).
Chris Horner writes: ”Wahl says Mann did indeed ask Wahl to destroy records, and Wahl did.”
Flat-out untrue and Horner has shown no evidence to support that claim. In fact, Chris Horner himself in an earlier articlestates that Dr. Mann said he did not delete emails. So, Chris Horner, which is it? Are you lying or can you not read your own writing?
Chris Horner, in addition to writing for The Daily Caller, is an attorney who has represented the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). CEI is no friend of the truth but has been very friendly with ExxonMobil and Koch Industries among others.
This is nothing new for Horner, who has also falsely “accused NASA’s chief climate scientist, James Hansen, of “doctor[ing] temperature data on two occasions in 2001 and once in 2007 in attempts to show an impending climate catastrophe.”
On ClimateAudit, McIntyre published the leaked partial transcript and writes: “From Capitol Hill come excerpted notes from the interview transcript between the NOAA Inspector General and Eugene Wahl.”
Horner writes here of the leaked transcript, “This has been confirmed to Senate offices.”
So it would appear that the source is a Senator. And what a shock that Sen. Inhofe was the fastest to repost these lies. And what a shock that one of his former staffers was one of the fastest to repost these lies — though, in fairness to Marc “Swift Boat smearer” Morano, I’m quite certain he would have reposted these lies no matter what the source (see Even now, ClimateDepot’s Marc Morano reiterates his call for a “hostile reaction” to climate scientists).
Let me give the final word to one of the country’s leading climate scientists, Michael Mann:
The claim by fossil fuel industry lobbyist Chris Horner in his “Daily Caller” piece that I told Eugene W
That this inconvenient fact has driven hundreds of blog posts, dozens of fevered accusations, a basket load of FOI requests, and stoked multiple fires of manufactured outrage is far more a testimony to personal obsession, rather than to its intrinsic importance. The science of paleo-reconstructions has moved well beyond this issue, as has the interest of the general public in such minutiae. We can however expect the usual suspects to continue banging this drum, long after everyone else has gone home.
===
McCullagh argues that his so-called “disclosures” will “probably not aid the political prospects of the Democrats’ cap and trade bill,” and quotes CEI’s Chris Horner: “It’s nice to see they’re not spinning each other behind closed doors.” Horner, who filed the FOIA request, runs global warming denial blogs for CEI and the National Review. In June, McCullagh breathlessly promoted CEI’s other “scandal” of a global warming denier economist who works for the EPA. carlin
Opponents of clean energy reform are inflating the costs of action by 1,000 percent, while minimizing that the threat of climate change and our dependence on fossil fuels. Ironically, these lies may actually aid the political prospects of action, as the American public grow more disgusted with the unethical tactics of polluters and their right-wing allies.
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Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute who specializes in harassing climate scientists with nuisance lawsuits and Freedom of Information fishing expeditions, angles the table mic over to his mouth. “You can believe this is about the climate,” he says darkly, “and many people do, but it’s not a reasonable belief.” Horner, whose prematurely silver hair makes him look like a right-wing Anderson Cooper, likes to invoke Saul Alinsky: “The issue isn’t the issue.” The issue, apparently, is that “no free society would do to itself what this agenda requires…. The first step to that is to remove these nagging freedoms that keep getting in the way.” naimi k see kliencc
attacks Hansen: http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/06/28/253240/fox-news-james-hansen/
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Climate change skeptic Horner sweeps BP CEO's meeting with Cheney under the rug
June 15, 2010 7:21 pm ET — 6 Comments
Writing on Andrew Breitbart's Big Government blog, Chris Horner whitewashed the role BP executives played in Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force to attack Democrats over two meetings with BP officials. BP's CEO reportedly met with Cheney and his energy task force in 2001.
Horner falsely suggests BP's CEO did not meet with Bush White House
Horner: "4,700 days ... since the last time a BP CEO was in the Oval Office."Chris Horner, a climate change skeptic, wrote in a post on BigGovernment.com: "So President Obama is meeting in the White House tomorrow with BP's chairman. The focus of public discussion of this event has been on it taking until the 57th day or so since the Deepwater Horizon rig caught fire following a well explosion, precipitating the ongoing oil leak." Horner continued:
The more relevant figure is 4,700. If my quick calculation has it right, that's the number of days since the last time a BP CEO was in the Oval Office. On that day, August 4, 1997, then-CEO, (then-Sir) John Browne, joined by Ken Lay, met in the Oval with President Clinton and Vice President Gore.
BP CEO participated in Cheney's energy task force, including a separate meeting with Cheney
BP's CEO reportedly met with Cheney. A November 16, 2005, Washington Post article reported, "A White House document shows that executives from big oil companies met with Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001 -- something long suspected by environmentalists but denied as recently as last week by industry officials testifying before Congress." The article further reported, "Cheney had a separate meeting with John Browne, BP's chief executive, according to a person familiar with the task force's work."
Other BP officials met with task force.The Washington Post article also reported that based on records kept by the Secret Service, "[o]n March 22, staff members met with BP regional president Bob Malone, chief economist Peter Davies and company employees Graham Barr and Deb Beaubien." The BP representatives reportedly "met in the White House complex with the Cheney aides who were developing a national energy policy."
Horner is funded by the oil industry
CEI has received millions of dollars from ExxonMobil. According to reports compiled by Greenpeace, ExxonMobil Corp. and its foundation donated more than $2 million to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, where Horner is a senior fellow, from 1998 through 2005.
CEI has received more than $600,000 from Koch family foundations.According to data compiled by Media Matters Action Network, from 1986 through 2004, CEI received $666,420 from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, and David H. Koch Charitable Foundation and Personal Philanthropy. Charles and David Koch reportedly each own 42 percent of Koch Industries, whose subsidiaries "have been in the petroleum business since 1940" and "engage in petroleum refining, chemicals and base oil production, crude oil supply, and wholesale marketing of fuels, base oils, petrochemicals, asphalt and other products." The president of the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation is Richard Fink, who is also president of the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. Fink is "an executive vice president and member of the board of directors of Koch Industries, Inc., where he leads the legal, government, community relations and communication capabilities for Koch Industries," according to his bio on the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation's website.
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climategate:
:{alerted by watts,
}:
"It appears that the proverbial Climate Science Cat is out of the bag," wrote Watts. He said that he had alerted two of the most vocal deniers in the US: the CEI's Christopher Horner and Marc Morano, a former staffer for Sen. Inhofe. Morano is also the editor of **:{Climate Depot:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**[92], a Drudge Report-like clearinghouse for climate skeptics run by the oil-funded think tank Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow [93]. Blogger Terry Hurlbut posted [94] excerpts of the emails on a conservative news site, the Examiner.
Even as the buzz around the emails kept building, scientists tried to dismiss them as a non-story. By the time they reacted, the story was entering the news bloodstream.
Even as the buzz around the emails kept building, scientists tried to dismiss them as a non-story. Jones only acknowledged the theft two days after the emails became public, in an interview with the New Zealand magazine **:{Investigate:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**[95]. He said he wasn't sure what exactly was in the hacked data, and noted that the university had not even alerted the police.
By the time the scientists finally reacted, the story was entering the news bloodstream. On the evening of November 19, CEI's Horner first wrote about it [20] on the National Review's website, calling it the "blue-dress moment" for climate change—alluding to the infamous evidence of Bill Clinton's sexual exploits. That same day, Mosher sent a Facebook message to New York Timesreporter Andrew Revkin, flagging the emails. Revkin wrote about them [96] the next day, November 20, noting that they were "causing a stir among global warming skeptics."
Meanwhile, CEI, which has also enjoyed Koch and ExxonMobil funding, trotted out Horner at every opportunity: In May 2010, he wrote about what he called "green thuggery" at the National Review's website. In July 2010, Michaels was back [109] in the Wall Street Journalopinion pages accusing scientists of "ugly pressure tactics" and "professional misconduct, data manipulation and jiggering of both the scientific literature and climatic data."
Nevertheless, no company appears to be working harder to support those who debunk global warming. “Many corporations have funded, you know, dribs and drabs here and there, but I would be surprised to learn that there was a bigger one than Exxon,” explains Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which, in 2000 and again in 2003, sued the government to stop the dissemination of a Clinton-era report showing the impact of climate change in the United States. Attorney Christopher Horner—whom you’ll recall from Crichton’s audience—was the lead attorney in both lawsuits and is paid a $60,000 annual consulting fee by the CEI. In 2002, ExxonMobil explicitly earmarked $60,000 for the CEI for “legal activities.”
--
Litigation
In 2000, Ebell was a plaintiff, along with several members of Congress, including Sen. James Inhofe (R, OK), who sued the National Science and Technology Council, President Bill Clinton, and the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs asserted that the National Assessment on Climate Change report—which details likely state-by-state consequences of anthropogenic climate change—violated several federal open-meeting, appropriations and research statutes.
11/2011
http://www.southernstudies.org/2011/11/attorney-with-group-targeting-KKoch-funded conference
The American Tradition Institute -- a global-warming denier group that's using the Freedom of Information Act in controversial ways to discredit climate scientists -- suffered a legal loss this week when a judge allowed one of the scientists to intervene in a lawsuit against the University of Virginia.
But ATI's director of litigation is not letting that setback slow his crusade against environmental regulation.
Christopher Horner is one of the featured speakers at this weekend's Defending the American Dream Summit sponsored by the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, the nonprofit sister group of Americans for Prosperity, a corporate-interest advocacy group. AFP was founded and is heavily funded by the Koch brothers, the billionaire owners of the Koch Industries oil and chemical conglomerate.
Horner is also a fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free-market advocacy group that has been one of the main organizers in the effort to block regulation of greenhouse gas emissions. CEI has received generous funding from ExxonMobil, Texaco and the Koch Family Foundations.
Horner is scheduled to speak at 3:15 p.m. today on a panel titled "Extreme Power Abuse: The EPA's Job-Crushing Regulatory Assault." He will be joined on the panel by U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.), who has close ties to Koch Industries, which is located in his district. Pompeo's chief of staff is a former lawyer for the company, and Pompeo has proposed legislation that would benefit many of Koch's business interests, according to the Washington Post. A political science professor at the University of Kansas has characterized Pompeo as "the congressman from Koch."
Also speaking on today's panel with Horner are Kathleen Hartnett White of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think tank that is funded by the Koch Family Foundations, and Ann McElhinney, maker of the film "Not Evil, Just Wrong: The True Cost of Global Warming Hysteria."
Another featured speaker at the conference is Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R), who's also involved in an ongoing legal action against U.Va. seeking the emails of former professor Michael Mann, one of the scientists targeted by ATI who this week was allowed to intervene in the group's FOIA suit against the school. However, Cuccinelli is not speaking about that action or his effort to challenge the Environmental Protection Agency's finding that greenhouse gas pollution endangers human health. Instead, he is speaking about his effort to challenge President Obama's health care reform law on a panel titled "Critical Care: Your Health Care After the Takeover."
The summit kicked off last evening with screenings of the documentary films "The Cartel," which attacks teachers' unions and supports vouchers, and "Free or Equal," an update of the 1980 film "Free to Choose" that featured free-market economist Milton Friedman. The gathering continues tomorrow with a "Cut Spending Now" rally and sessions on tax policy, grassroots mobilization, promoting school choice, killing collective bargaining, and how to "pimp" (their word) one's website.
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ati bs bio:
Christopher C. Horner, JD – Director of Litigation, Environmental Law Center
Christopher C. Horner is a Senior Fellow for American Tradition Institute, as well as Director of Litigation for ATI’s Environmental Law Center.
Mr. Horner is a senior fellow with the Washington DC think tank the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and is affiliated with European counterpart organizations and has represented think tanks, scientists and Members of the U.S. House and Senate on matters of environmental policy in the federal courts.
He has written on numerous topics in publications ranging from law reviews to legal and industrial trade journals to print and online opinion pages, and is the author of three best-selling books: **:{Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**(Regnery, 2010); **:{Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**(Regnery, 2008) and **:{The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**(Regnery, 2007), which spent half of 2007 on the New York Times bestseller list.
Horner has testified before the United States Senate Committees on Foreign Relations and Environment and Public Works, and works on a legal and policy level with numerous think tanks and policy organizations throughout the world. He has given numerous addresses to audiences in the European Parliament in Strasbourg and Brussels, and before policymakers in European capitals including London, Rome, Prague, Copenhagen, Madrid and Warsaw, on topics ranging from rail deregulation and unfunded pension liability to all manner of energy and environment issues. Horner serves on the international law practice group’s executive committee for an internationally respected assembly of lawyers, and has provided counsel and work product on other matters including intellectual property, WTO proceedings and treaty law and policy.
Greenpeace has repeatedly targeted Mr. Horner, by stealing his garbage on a weekly basis, issuing press releases announcing with whom he dines and including him in various other hysterical publications including most recently “A Field Guide to Climate Criminals” distributed at the UN climate meeting in Montreal in December 2005.[can't find, sadly]
Mr. Horner has provided legal, policy and political commentary several hundred times each on both television and radio, in the United States, Europe, Canada, and Australia, including scores of visits each on the Fox News Channel, Court TV, MSNBC with repeat visits on The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, BBC, CNN, CNN International, ITN, CBC, Bloomberg and Reuters Television. Mr. Horner has also been a guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He has guest hosted television commentary programs and makes weekly appearances on and regularly guest hosts nationally and regionally syndicated radio shows in America.
He has been a frequent contributor to the Washington Times, National Review Online and TechCentralStation.com opinion pages, is a guest columnist for United Press International and OpinionEditorials.com, and has regularly contributed to the Brussels legislative news magazine EU Reporter .
Horner also regularly writes for Energy Tribune, American Spectator Online, Daily Caller, PajamasMedia, and Spain’s Actualidad Economica.
He received his Juris Doctorate from Washington University in St. Louis where he received the Judge Samuel Breckenridge Award for Advocacy.
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fedsoc
Christopher C. Horner
Publications
:{An Assessment of the June 2012 Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development
Engage Volume 13, Issue 1, March 2012
April 24, 2012}:
:{Kyoto II as Congressional-Executive Agreement: The Emerging Strategy?
February 16, 2009}:
September 5, 2002}:
**:{Competitive Enterprise Institute to sue RealClimate blogger over moderation policy:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
By Joe Romm on Nov 25, 2009 at 12:08 pm
Gavin Schmidt has done a wonderful job at RealClimate patiently explaining the context of the stolen emails. He’s made it perfectly clear that the claims of scientific malpractice are without foundation. He must be doing a really good job, because the Competitive Enterprise Institute intends to sue him.
That’s computer scientist Tim Lambert aka Deltoid explaining (here) the latest tactics the anti-scientific disinformers are pursuing to stifle real climate scientists from communicating with the public. The CEI, of course, runs ad campaigns aimed at destroying the climate for centuries; generally spreads disinformation (see “Santer, Jones, and Schneider respond to CEI’s phony attack on the temperature record“) and embraces the efforts of other groups to sow confusion (see “Deniers go ape for Scopes climate trial“).
But CEI’s current tactics, which they proudly announce here, have become truly extemist in nature:
[CEI seeks documents] relating to the content, importance, or propriety of workday-hour posts or entries by GISS/NASA employee Gavin A. Schmidt on the weblog or “blog” RealClimate, which is owned by the advocacy Environmental Media Services and was started as an effort to defend the debunked “Hockey Stick” that is so central to the CRU files. RealClimate.org is implicated in the leaked files and expressly offered as a tool to be used “in any way you think would be helpful” to a certain advocacy campaign, including an assertion of Schmidt’s active involvement in, e.g., delaying and/or screening out unhelpful input by “skeptics” attempting to comment on claims made on the website.
This, and the related political activism engaged in, are inappropriate behavior for a taxpayer-funded employee, particularly on taxpayer time. These documents were requested in January 2007 and NASA/GISS have refused to date to comply with their legal obligation to produce responsive documents.
Lambert notes:
Yes they’re planning to sue Schmidt for the “inappropriate behavior” of moderating comments at RealClimate. Of course, the point of this vexatious suit isn’t to win — it’s to harass and distract Schmidt because he is being effective.
It’s not for nothing that I dubbed them the Completely Evil Institute.
I would add that essentially every factual assertion in the above excerpt from the piece by CEI Fellow Chris Horner is false.
The disinformers are obsessed with the Hockey Stick analysis, even though it is just the tiniest piece of our overall understanding of climate science, which is getting increasingly dire by the day (see Climate science statement from the Met Office, NERC and the Royal Society: “even since the 2007 IPCC Assessment the evidence for dangerous, long-term and potentially irreversible climate change has strengthened”).
The ‘hockey stick’ was, in fact, essentially vindicated by the National Academy of Sciences (see NAS Report and RealClimate.org). And more important than the fact that the original analysis was defensibly correct, is that the conclusions were correct [which could be true even if the analysis had flaws in it]. Is the planet now as hot (or hotter) than it has been in a millenium? Try two millennia (see “Sorry deniers, hockey stick gets longer, stronger: Earth hotter now than in past 2,000 years“). See also “Human-caused Arctic warming overtakes 2,000 years of natural cooling, ‘seminal’ study finds.” That’s why climatologist and one-time darling of the contrarians Ken Caldeira said last month, “To talk about global cooling at the end of the hottest decade the planet has experienced in many thousands of years is ridiculous.”
RealClimate was not started as an effort to defend the Hockey Stick, but rather to “to provide a quick response to developing stories and provide the context sometimes missing in mainstream commentary” on climate science in general (see RC’s About page). As for being “owned by the advocacy Environmental Media Services,” RealClimate explains patiently in its Disclaimer:
The contributors to this site do so in a personal capacity during their spare time and their posts do not represent the views of the organizations for which they work, nor the agencies which fund them. The contributors are solely responsible for the content of the site and receive no remuneration for their contributions.
RealClimate is not affiliated with any environmental organisations. Although our domain is being hosted by Environmental Media Services, and our initial press release was organised for us by Fenton Communications, neither organization was in any way involved in the initial planning for RealClimate, and have never had any editorial or other control over content. Neither Fenton nor EMS has ever paid any contributor to RealClimate.org any money for any purpose at any time. Neither do they pay us expenses, buy our lunch or contract us to do research. This information has always been made clear to anyone who asked.
CEI received over $2 million from ExxonMobil from 1998 to 2005, but that is no doubt purely a coincidence.
===
STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER C. HORNER TO THE JOINT HEARING OF THE SENATE COMMITTEES ON FOREIGN RELATIONS AND ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
June 24, 2002
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the opportunity to testify before this joint panel on a topic of great importance. The scope of today’s hearing is broad, so I focus my testimony upon the propriety of the U.S. agreeing to amend the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC, or Rio Treaty), by ratifying the Kyoto Protocol.[[1]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn1)
For whatever specific reasons (economic growth, failure to foresee the energy requirements of the “new economy”, or other), the U.S., like many nations, failed to meet its voluntary Rio targets.[[2]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn2)
Now some advocates assert, “Because the U.S. has not met its Rio goal, we must commit to even greater mandatory reductions (Kyoto)”. Attempting instead to comply with the initial treaty seems the more appropriate response, for several reasons.
Rio went into force in March 1994. President Clinton did not request, nor did Congress enact, independent legislation implementing Rio, which was not an inherently self-executing treaty.[[3]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn3) Authority and precedent make clear that responsibility for proposing such programs lies with the White House.[[4]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn4) If our “non-binding” Rio obligations in fact “bound” the U.S. to achieve specific reductions[[5]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn5) -- contrary to contemporary Senate and Executive assertions of U.S. intent -- then the Executive interpretation of Rio Article 4 throughout the 1990s was actually incorrect, and is responsible. The pending question is apparently: does the U.S. respond by attempting to meet such Rio promises, or by making further, even deeper, binding promises?
Skipping specific pursuit of the U.S.’ Rio promises, in favor of Kyoto’s binding commitments even greater than those we’ve failed to attain, seems highly illogical. Compounding this of course is that, precisely five years ago tomorrow, the Senate unanimously spoke to what it recognized was an unacceptable drift away from the U.S. Rio stance adamantly opposed to binding commitments. The Senate, seeing what was developing, asserted its “Advice” pursuant to Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, passing S. Res. 98.[[6]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn6)
Subsequent to and despite this Advice, U.S. negotiators clearly disregarded both major Byrd-Hagel recommendations: Kyoto did not require developing countries to share our commitments, and even the Clinton White House economic advisors have recanted their refutations of the Kyoto cost estimates.[[7]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn7)
Since then, nothing has emerged to indicate that Kyoto does not still violate both key Byrd-Hagel conditions, and it is likely that very few Senators have amended their position against a treaty causing “serious economic harm.” However, Clinton Administration officials did admit that they began working on the plan for binding commitments within one year after Rio went into effect.[[8]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn8)
Kyoto, too, is clearly intended to be a similar step in a “treaty hopping” campaign: even the models on which it is based predict an undetectable climatic impact[[9]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn9) -- at a cost to the U.S. of up to $400 billion annually[[10]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn10) -- but instead may be 1/30th of what its proponents seek.[[11]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn11) Rio and Kyoto offer differing commitments but purport “the same ultimate objective.”[[12]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn12) The UN IPCC has said this means reducing GHG emissions by as much as 60-80%, which wildly exceeds Kyoto’s specified ambitions.
As such the U.S. should require, prior to and as part of ratifying any further agreements, express acknowledgement not only of the actual “ultimate goal”, but that it is committed to its practical requirements, in this case up to “30 Kyotos”.
Such “treaty hopping” agendas illustrate the importance of Senate treaty “reservations”, or the Senate’s second bite at the “Advice” apple. This comes of course during the “Consent” function, which function the U.S. negotiators unfortunately eviscerated. After agreeing to terms incompatible with Byrd-Hagel, the Administration also accepted Kyoto’s prohibition on reservations, or the Senate’s ability to specify the specific understandings or conditions of the U.S. commitment. This despite the Senate also having forewarned the administration about this in advance of Kyoto.[[13]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn13)
In summation, President Bush ought to match his assertions of having “rejected” Kyoto with the requisite submission to the UN to that effect, as was done regarding the International Criminal Court.[[14]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftn14) In the absence of that act, the White House must at minimum assist resolution of the ambiguous U.S. role in Kyoto by requesting the Senate disapprove of the treaty. In the absence of that, the Senate should recognize that there is no reverse equivalent of the “presentment” clause, regarding treaties. Only protocol, not any constitutional prohibition, impedes Senate consideration of a signed treaty. Certainly given the imperative rhetoric surrounding Kyoto, if President Bush insists on continuing the U.S.’ ambiguous role the Senate should take matters into its own hands, and decide the fate of this agreement.
That resolution should by definition be rejection of Kyoto. Otherwise, by accepting this double indignity of ignoring advice and prohibiting reservations, this body would condone Executive circumvention of the Senate’s constitutional treaty role.
As part of my testimony for the record, I include an article I have prepared for the Federalist Society, though still in draft form, addressing relevant issues surrounding the propriety of ratifying Kyoto, and recommending courses for withdrawal or otherwise pursuing clarification of the U.S.’ ambiguous treaty status. Thank you again for the opportunity to appear.
[[1]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref1) In Rio in 1992 the U.S. made, and the Senate unanimously ratified, various commitments regarding reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, both thematic and with a specific emission target (1990 levels).
[[2]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref2) See,e.g., http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/natc/eunc3.pdf. The EU, which under Kyoto has negotiated a “bubble” such that it could pool its increases and “reductions”, announced in May that it met its Rio target. It said it had reduced greenhouse gases by 3.5 percent below 1990 levels in 2000. This is commonly attributed to the ending of coal subsidies in Great Britain in their push to replace coal with gas, shutting down East German industry and that Europe did not match the U.S.’ decade-long economic expansion. Russia, e.g., met its target by regressing economically.
[[3]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref3) As the party charged with “making” treaties the Executive is responsible for meeting, or at minimum proposing legislation to affect, treaty commitments. President Clinton proposed a Btu tax, though not expressly in pursuit of Rio. It failed once and did not emerge again. He instituted his Climate Action Plan, which with minor recent modifications continues to this day with more than 50 voluntary programs, though a quick search of Thomas revealed no implementing legislation. Congress did appropriate money in response to proposals by the Executive. See,e.g., “Treaties and Other International Agreements: The Role of the United States Senate”, S. Rpt. 106-71, p.4.
[[4]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref4) “Implementation The executive branch has the primary responsibility for carrying out treaties and ascertaining that other parties fulfill their obligations after treaties and other international agreements enter into force, but the Senate or the entire Congress share in the following phases.” “Treaties and Other International Agreements”, p. 12. “A question that may be raised under U.S. law is whether or not Congress has a duty to implement a treaty which is in force internationally, but which requires additional legislation or implementation or an appropriation of funds to give effect to obligations assumed internationally by the United States. When implementation of a treaty requires domestic legislation or an appropriation of funds, only the Congress can provide them.” Id. at pp. 166-67.
The FRC Report continues, “The extent of congressional obligation to implement a treaty under U.S. law has not been resolved in principle. FN 61 According to an often-cited authority, Congress has generally responded ‘to a sense of duty to carry out what the treaty-makers promised, to a reluctance to defy and confront the President (especially after he can no longer retreat), to an unwillingness to make the U.S. system appear undependable, even ludicrous…’” Id. at 167, quoting Henkin, Louis. Foreign Affairs and the United States Constitution. 2d ed. 1996, pp. 205-206. The referenced FN 61 says in pertinent part, “[F]ailure to implement an internationally perfected treaty would constitute a violation of obligations assumed by the United States under international law. See Memorandum of April 12, 1976, by Monroe Leigh, Legal Adviser, Department of State, as quoted in U.S. Department of State. Digest of U.S. Practice in International Law 1976. 1977, p. 221.” This begs the question: “to precisely what extent was the “non-binding” Rio binding?
[[5]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref5) Addressing the question, above (FN 5), prior to ratification, “[t]he [Senate Foreign Relations] Committee made clear, in other words, its view that ‘[t]he final framework convention contains no legally binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions’…While these statements may not be as legally binding as a formal condition to the Senate’s ratification of the 1992 Convention [ed: reservations were prohibited by Rio’s terms], it is doubtful that any administration could ignore them.” “Global Climate Change: Selected Legal Questions about the Kyoto Protocol”, p. 4. CRS Report for Congress (March 29, 2001), citing in part 138 CONG. REC. 33521 (Oct. 7, 1992)(statement of Sen. McConnell).
To avoid future such uncertainty, in S.Res. 98 (105thCong., 1stSess., adopted at 143 CONG. REC. S 8138 (daily ed. July 25, 1997)), the Senate “stated the view that any agreement which would require Senate advice and consent should be accompanied by a detailed analysis of its economic impact and of any legislation and regulations necessary to implement the agreement.” See CRS Report at p. 6, FN 25.
[[6]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref6) “In mid-1997, as these negotiations were underway, the Senate passed S. Res. 98 [ed.: “Byrd-Hagel,” S.Res. 98 105th Congress (105-54 July 21, 1997)], which stated that the Senate would not approve any agreement on binding reductions in greenhouse gases that did not include commitments by developing countries as well as developed/industrialized countries, or that would result in harm to the U.S. economy. The administration has not transmitted the Kyoto Protocol to the Senate because, among other reasons, developing countries have to date not been willing to consider making binding commitments regarding their greenhouse gas emissions.” “Treaties and Other International Agreements”, p. 276.
The operative language is as follows: “Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that--
(1) the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto in December 1997, or thereafter, which would--
(A) mandate new commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for the Annex I Parties, unless the protocol or other agreement also mandates new specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for Developing Country Parties within the same compliance period, or
(B) would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States”.
[[7]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref7) “Economists from the Clinton White House now concede that complying with Kyoto’s mandatory reductions in greenhouse gases would be difficult - and more expensive to American consumers than they thought when they were in charge.”USA Today, 12 June 2001.
[[8]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref8) In 1996, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Rafe Pomerance asserted that “the administration has been working on this policy for more than a year”, quoted in Nature, 25 July 1996.
[[9]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref9) See, Testimony of Dr. Sallie Baliunas to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, at http://www.techcentralstation.com/1051/envirowrapper.jsp?PID=1051-450&CID=1051-031302C.**
[[10]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref10) U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Information Administration, Office of Integrated Analysis and Forecasting. “Impacts of the Kyoto Protocol on U.S. Energy markets and Economic Activity.” Washington, D.C. October 1998.
[[11]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref11) "Yet the climate simulations lead to the conclusion that the Kyoto reductions will have little effect in the twenty-first century (15), and ‘30 Kyotos’ may be needed to reduce warming to an acceptable level.’ James Hansen, Makiko Sato, Reto Ruedy, Andrew Lacis, and Valdar Oinas, “Global warming in the twenty-first century: An alternative scenario,” Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences, August 29, 2000.
Hansen was citing Malakoff, D. (1997) Science 278, 2048.
[[12]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref12) “[S]tabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.” See,e.g., Rio Article 2.
[[13]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref13) See “Treaties and Other International Agreements,” at 274.
[[14]](http://www.epw.senate.gov/107th/Horner_072402.htm#_ftnref14) The President manifested that this is how the United States makes “its intention clear to not become a party to the treaty,” as required by “customary” law and the Vienna Convention Article 18. “[S]ignature by the U.S. does impose an obligation on the U.S. under international law to refrain from actions that would undermine the Protocol’s object and purpose. That obligation continues to apply until such time as the U.S. ratifies the Protocol or makes clear its intent not to do so.” “Global Climate Change: Selected Legal Questions about the Kyoto Protocol”, CRS Report for Congress (March 29, 2001).
Though it has not yet done so, precedent indicates the Senate can also effect this outcome by passing a Sense of the Senate expressing disapproval of a signed, not ratified treaty. See, “Withdrawal,” in attached article.
boasts about 2/13/07
**:{http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/zs66pq/christopher-horner:(style="background:#ffffff"):}:**
2/13/07 id as cei and prgm, now RW Pol Inc bk
geet warmly, read bk and IPCC yours more interesting (graphs and data v cartoons) don't know sci,ust wait for end. why so heated, you are angry
titanic, icebergs attacking experts wd make $ if lived longer, dust bowl, then cooling, got rich put up sats to meas temp (surf does not matter), then did not like answer so chased diff ball/meas? gods must be angry, now consensus on GW
s all stuff in atmos must do something 2 why go to trouble, conspiracy commie tinged anti capitalist poop in holes
I'd say more Communist __; not conspiracy
the greens (the gays)
so called socialists and communists are in gov't in coalition w/ greens
went to wealth alleviation conf w/ german grns: worse to clear a forest than sell a child to asian brothel
just one crazy german
hist teaches us anything it's to listen to them [= hitler]
settle down ppl
js: clean air act etc has not hurt us economically
1st one 1963
have you killed a hobo, [dmists/plays] i cd be hurt
we spend $5 b/yr studying climate
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bs cei bio:
Christopher C. Horner serves as a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. As an attorney in Washington, DC Horner has represented CEI as well as scientists and Members of the U.S. House and Senate on matters of environmental policy in the federal courts and the Supreme Court.
He has written on numerous topics in publications ranging from law reviews to legal and industrial trade journals to print and online opinion pages, and is the author of two best-selling books: Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed (Regnery, 2008) and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism (Regnery, 2007), which spent half of 2007 on the New York Times bestseller list.
Mr. Horner has provided legal, policy and political commentary several hundred times each on both television and radio, in the United States, Europe, Canada, and Australia. Mr. Horner has also been a guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
He has been a frequent contributor in the Washington Times, National Review Online and TechCentralStation.com opinion pages, is a guest columnist for United Press International and OpinionEditorials.com, and has regularly contributed to the Brussels legislative news magazine EU Reporter. Horner also regularly writes for Energy Tribune and Spain's Actualidad Economica.
Horner has testified before the United States Senate Committees on Foreign Relations and Environment and Public Works, and works on a legal and policy level with numerous think tanks and policy organizations throughout the world. He has given numerous addresses to audiences in the European Parliament and before policymakers in multiple European capitals on topics ranging from rail deregulation and unfunded pension liability to all manner of energy and environment issues. Horner serves on the international law practice group’s executive committee for an internationally respected assembly of lawyers.
He received his Juris Doctorate from Washington University in St. Louis where he received the Judge Samuel Breckenridge Award for Advocacy.
award for activism does not now exist?
Judge Samuel M. Breckenridge Fund Prizes
The Breckenridge Practice Court Prizes - First Prize and Second Prize
These prizes are based upon proficiency in the preparation of briefs, mastery of subject matter, and excellence in presentation of oral arguments in moot court competitions. The winners receive: cash prizes; certificates; and the prizes appear on each transcript.
The Breckenridge Scholarship Prizes - First Prize and Second Prize
These prizes are awarded at the end of each school year to the two students in each J.D. Class having the first and second highest academic averages for that school year. The winners receive: cash prizes; certificates; and the prizes appear on each transcript.
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Democrats' climate probe brings ‘witch hunt’ accusations
Arizona Rep. Raúl Grijalva is on a mission to expose climate skeptics. Some say he's going too far.
By ALEX GUILLÉN
2/27/15 5:51 AM EST
Updated 2/28/15 6:28 AM EST
Now conservatives are the ones complaining about being the victims in a politically motivated “war on science.”
In a turnabout from years of debate about intrusion into scientific research, Democratic lawmakers launched investigations this week into the funding sources of several scientists whose work is popular with skeptics of manmade climate change. And that’s bringing a furious counterattack from congressional Republicans and right-wing pundits — including some who cheered on a past probe by former Republican Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli into a leading scientist whose research pointed to man-made causes of climate change.
Arizona Rep. Raúl Grijalva, the top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, sparked the latest dispute by asking universities to turn over documents about grants, congressional testimony and other activities involving seven scientists who have testified at congressional climate hearings. Grijalva was following up on a New York Times story reporting that Wei-Hock “Willie” Soon, a researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, had gotten $1.25 million in undisclosed money from fossil fuel companies.
Three Democratic senators then took up the case, asking more than 100 energy companies and trade groups to provide details on their research spending.
Supporters of Soon’s research say it casts doubt on human activity being a major driver of global warming. That made the Times story a public relations coup for the green activists who originally uncovered the documents on his funding. But Grijalva’s broadened inquiry prompted conservatives to accuse him of staging an ideological witch hunt, and even one green-minded science group expressed qualms he may have gone too far. Eleven Republican senators rebuked both Democratic probes on Friday as “wholly inappropriate.”
Still, Democrats are undeterred, saying the two cases are in no way comparable. They note that a strong majority of climate scientists say climate change is real, is primarily driven by human-caused greenhouse gas pollution and poses a threat to civilization.
“Republicans went after amazing scientists doing honest and great work on climate change,” said a spokesman for Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who helped lead the Senate Democrats’ information request to the energy trade groups. Spokesman Eben Burnham-Snyder added, “What’s different here are some clear indications that the very same companies and trade groups who have been sowing doubt on climate change and stopping any sort of legislative action in Congress, also may have been participating in these ‘denial for hire’ operations where they would pay very specifically for results.”
Grijalva was unavailable to comment on the flap Thursday.
But critics of his document request were quick to liken it to McCarthyism — or worse.
“Are You Now or Have You Ever Been a Climate Skeptic?” asked a headline on the conservative blog Power Line, which appeared atop a post written by one of the researchers Grijalva is probing,Steven F. Haywardof Pepperdine University. The climate skeptic blog Junk Science alleged that Grijalva’s probe “closes in on 1933 Germany, and the Soviet Union.”
But Power Line had a different take on Cuccinelli’s climate probe five years ago, after the then-attorney general ordered the University of Virginia to turn over 11 years of emails and a raft of other documents involving former UVA scientist Michael Mann. Cuccinelli said he wanted to know whether Mann had manipulated data as part of his research, which included a now-famous “hockey stick” graphic showing a sharp increase in global temperatures linked to human activity.
“Cuccinelli’s subpoena has been greeted with howls and protests from warmists and others who view inquiry into a scientist’s work as an infringement of academic freedom — the freedom, that is, to make stuff up, hide or falsify data, and thereby impose trillions of dollars of costs on consumers, all while being supported by taxpayers,”Power Line’s John Hinderaker wrote in May 2010.
Similarly, JunkScience’s Steve Milloy wrote in The Washington Times five years ago that greens’ claims that Cuccinelli was threatening academic freedom were “so much rot.”
“A thorough investigation by someone not in cahoots with the climate mob is the only way to answer legitimate questions related to the expenditure of taxpayer money,” Milloy wrote at the time.
Much like Markey’s spokesman, Hinderaker said Thursday that the Cuccinelli and Grijalva probes are “completely different.”
“The Cuccinelli [document demand] related to the substance of work done by Michael Mann,” Hinderaker wrote in an email to POLITICO. He added: “The Grijalva ‘investigation’ is merely an attempt to smear scientists and others by claiming that they received funding from various private sources; it does not relate to the substance of anything they have written … As you know if you have read my posts, I believe that it is government money, not private money, that is corrupt, because government is the main party in interest in the global warming controversy.”
Cuccinelli’s probe fizzled after the Virginia Supreme Court ruled he did not have the power to demand the university records.
Unlike Cuccinelli, who sought the documents under Virginia’s Fraud Against Taxpayers Act, Grijalva and the other Democratic lawmakers don’t have subpoena power to back up their requests. But the Democrats are citing a motivation similar to what Cuccinelli had offered: protecting taxpayers from policy influenced by bad science.
“Companies with a direct financial interest in climate and air quality standards are funding environmental research that influences state and federal regulations and shapes public understanding of climate science,” Grijalva wrote in letters Tuesday to seven universities, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Colorado and Georgia Tech. “These conflicts should be clear to stakeholders, including policymakers who use scientific information to make decisions.”
Grijalva requested information dating back to 2007, including all drafts of the scientists’ testimony before government bodies, the researchers’ sources of external funding, their financial disclosure forms and “communications” regarding their testimony and funding sources.
Markey and Democratic Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Barbara Boxer of California followed up the next day by asking more than 100 energy companies and trade groups, including the American Petroleum Institute and the National Mining Association, to disclose details on their research funding over the past 10 years.
“This investigation will help to determine who is funding these denial-for-hire operations and whether those who are funded by these fossil fuel interests are keeping their funders’ identities secret from the public and legislators,” Markey said in a statement.
The mining association responded to POLITICO that it “has not financed scientific research on climate change,” although it has commissioned studies on topics including “the serious and far reaching economic consequences of proposed policies ostensibly advanced to address climate change.” API said it is looking into the matter.
Grijalva’s investigation and the Democratic senators’ questions got a rebuttal Friday from all 11 Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, who wrote to the same universities, energy groups and companies to tell them the inquiry was out of line. “We ask you to not be afraid of political repercussions or public attacks regardless of how you respond,” the Republicans wrote.
The scientists themselves were quick to denounce Grijalva’s probe.
“I know with complete certainty that this investigation is a politically motivated ‘witch hunt’ designed to intimidate me (and others) and to smear my name,” Roger Pielke Jr., a professor at the University of Colorado’s Center for Science and Technology Policy Research, wrote on his blog Tuesday under a photo of former Sen. Joe McCarthy.
“I have no funding, declared or undeclared, with any fossil fuel company or interest. I never have,” he added, a statement the university backed up.
Pielke rejects the label of climate skeptic but has questioned the notion that greenhouse gas emissions are connected to the increasing costs of natural disasters. He notes that he supports EPA’s climate regulations and has advocated a small tax on carbon emissions. Still, his views have made him a target for liberals, leading him to quickly part ways last year with the website FiveThirtyEight just a few months after its relaunch.
“Incessant attacks and smears are effective,” Pielke lamented this week.
Other researchers Grijalva is targeting include David Legates of the University of Delaware, John Christy of the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Judith Curry of Georgia Tech and Richard Lindzen of MIT. Many of them reject the notion that they are climate change skeptics, although their work has drawn the attention of the skeptic camp. Christy, for example, testified before Congress that climate models overstate the atmosphere’s sensitivity to greenhouse gases, while Curry has maintained that forecasting the climate is more uncertain that many scientists admit.
Curry took to her own blog to blast Grijalva’s request.
“I don’t think anything good will come of this,” she wrote. “I anticipate that Grijalva will not find any kind of an undisclosed fossil fuel smoking gun from any of the 7 individuals under investigation.”
Hayward, from Pepperdine, wrote on Power Line that he has received “no grants, honoraria, consulting fees, good karma baubles, or even Christmas cards from any fossil fuel interest, though I’d be proud and open about it if I did.” He also questioned the wisdom of judging scientists’ work based on who pays for the research.
“Is the good congressman really telling us that he is incapable of assessing factual claims and judgments about the wisdom of policy on the merits alone?” he wrote. “That doesn’t speak well of his probity.”
Even some groups that support acting on climate change have expressed worries that Grijalva’s questions may intrude on academic freedom. Michael Halpern of the Union of Concerned Scientists wrote in a blog post that Grijalva’s questions about funding are appropriate, but said his request for drafts of congressional testimony amounts to an investigation into private communications.
“Just as I have supported universities’ efforts to protect communications among academics that constitute the research process, so, too, I see justification in protecting drafts of congressional testimony,” Halpern wrote.
The American Meteorological Society jumped into the fray Friday, writing to Grijalva that “publicly singling out specific researchers based on perspectives they have expressed … sends a chilling message to all academic researchers.”
Mann, the former University of Virginia scientist, told National Journal that Grijalva’s letter “does come across as sort of heavy handed and overly aggressive.”
Meanwhile, some climate-skeptic groups chose to mimic Grijalva’s probe by filing a similar request for information about University of Delaware climate scientist John Byrne.
“The sole distinctions are, first, that we far more narrowly tailor our request in comparison to Rep. Grijalva’s; second, our request is made pursuant to statutory authority,” wrote the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, the Energy & Environment Legal Institute and the Caesar Rodney Institute.
REQUEST UNDER THE DELAWARE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT February 25, 2015 Lawrence White Vice President and General Counsel 124C Hullihen Hall University of Delaware Newark, DE 19716 BY ELECTRONIC MAIL -- lawwhite@udel.edu Dear Mr. White/University FOIA Officer,
Christopher C. Horner, Esq. for the Free Market Environmental Law Clinic Mailing address for productions: 1489 Kinross Lane Keswick, VA 22947 __/s/__ Craig Richardson Executive Director Energy & Environment Legal Institute 722 12th ST NW 4th Fl Washington DC 20005 __/s/__ David T. Stevenson Director, Center for Energy Competitiveness Caesar Rodney Institute 420 Corporate Blvd Newark, DE 19702
:{horner http://eelegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/EELI-FME-Law-Delaware-Byrne-FOIA-request.pdf
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/climate-change-study-funding-raul-grijalva-115568.html#ixzz3TXnLkCMi}:
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