INSIDE THE WIRE

<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">hmmn belated, premature or not needed?</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">see SWAMP THINGS</font></p>

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<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">&nbsp;neglect in that not all tracked here but on indiv nodes</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">see swamp, which mostly refers to lobbyists getting jobs to neuter regs in their industry (distinction mebbe lost 1/19)

&nbsp;</font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Bernhardt runs DOI pendejo BLM; Wheeler runs EPA</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div>

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<div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">refers to regulatory capture, an extreme version of revolving door</font></div>

<div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">crypto?</font></div>

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<div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">2X SWAMP THING HAS LNK</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">----</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">OS</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><p style="padding: 5px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 0);"><span style="font-weight: bolder;">'Shadow lobbying' in Trump's Washington</span>
October 3, 2019</font></p><p style="padding: 5px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 0);">Political operatives and lobbyists continue to take spins through the&nbsp;<b>revolving door&nbsp;</b>between government and the private sector under President Donald Trump's watch, despite his pledge to "drain the swamp."</font></p><p style="padding: 5px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">And without action from Congress to change lobbying rules, undisclosed lobbying activities are still running rampant, an OpenSecrets analysis indicates.
[<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/reports/shadow-lobbying-2019" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Read more</a>]</font></p><p style="padding: 5px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p><p style="padding: 5px 0px; color: rgb(33, 43, 74); font-family: "Open Sans", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-weight: bolder; color: rgb(133, 22, 41);">Out of the swamp... or into the shadows?</span>
June 28, 2017</p><p style="padding: 5px 0px; color: rgb(33, 43, 74); font-family: "Open Sans", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">People change jobs all the time, but what does that mean in the lobbying world? Our research found that nearly a third of the lobbyists who stayed at the same organization, but did not report any lobbying activity in the first quarter, have titles that indicate they are still working on influencing U.S. federal policy. Was the swamp drained, or are they simply trying to circumvent the rules? [<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/reports/shadow-lobbying" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(62, 114, 181); text-decoration-line: none;">Read more</a>]</p></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div>https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/01/14/climate/fossil-fuel-industry-environmental-policy.html</div><div>
</div><div>a small number of people at a few federal agencies have vast power over the protection of American air and water.</div><div>
</div><div>Under the Trump administration, the people appointed to those positions overwhelmingly used to work in the fossil fuel, chemical and agriculture industries. During their time in government they have been responsible for loosening or undoing nearly 100 environmental protections from pollution and pesticides, as well as weakening preservations of natural resources and efforts to curb planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.</div><div>
</div><div>Of 20 key officials across several agencies, 15 came from careers in the oil, gas, coal, chemical or agriculture industries, while another three hail from state governments that have spent years resisting environmental regulations. At least four have direct ties to organizations led by Charles G. and the late David H. Koch, who have spent millions of dollars to defeat climate change and clean energy measures.</div><div>
</div><div>Gretchen Goldman, research director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, noted that many Republican administrations had brought in people from regulated industries. “There’s nothing inherently wrong with hiring people from the private sector. But we need to make sure they are making decisions in the public interest,” she said.</div><div>
</div><div>The Trump administration has said it is focused on ending government overreach, and agency officials said it should be no surprise the administration has tapped people who have dealt first-hand with regulations and share President Trump’s deregulatory goals. Administration press officers added that top agency officials had spent years in public service as well as in the private sector; that all agency officials undergo ethics training; and that those who have worked for industry had signed recusal statements.</div><div>
</div><div>“Senior administration officials, an overwhelming majority of whom the Senate has given their advice and consent to, understand that economic growth and environmental protection do not need to conflict,” Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, said in a statement.</div><div>
</div><div>The Environmental Protection Agency</div><div>
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</div><div>When Cleveland’s heavily polluted Cuyahoga River caught fire in 1969, it galvanized the nation and helped lead to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Since then, the E.P.A. has tracked pollution and enacted regulations to guide clean air and water laws and reduce levels of toxic substances. The Trump administration has argued the agency’s rules have become too onerous — particularly for the fossil fuel and agriculture industries.</div><div>
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</div><div>Andrew R. Wheeler</div><div>Head of the E.P.A.</div><div>Former fossil fuel lobbyist. Now in charge of regulating (and deregulating) industry.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>As a lobbyist, Mr. Wheeler represented an electric utility, a uranium producer and, most significantly, a coal magnate who paid Mr. Wheeler’s former lobbying firm more than $2.7 million over eight years to loosen restrictions on coal companies.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Wheeler’s job is to enforce clean air and water laws. During his tenure, he has rolled back regulations and made it easier for highly polluting coal plants to keep operating.</div><div>
</div><div>Peter Wright</div><div>Head of land and emergency management</div><div>Previously represented Dow Chemical in the cleanup of toxic Superfund sites. Now oversees E.P.A.’s Superfund cleanup program.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Wright spent 19 years as an attorney at Dow, one of the world’s largest chemical makers. He fought to lessen Dow’s responsibility to contribute to the cleanup of a toxic waste site in Midland, Mich.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Wright oversees the E.P.A.’s ongoing cleanup of thousands of Superfund sites, as well as emergency response and waste programs.</div><div>
</div><div>Anne Idsal pension --> lobby</div><div>Head of air office</div><div>Former attorney at Texas environment agencies that fought federal regulations. Now oversees regulations that limit air pollution at the E.P.A.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Ms. Idsal worked at Texas state agencies that sued the E.P.A. over a plan to reduce air pollution in the state and require new controls on coal-fired power plants. In 2017 she told the Texas Observer she wasn’t sure whether humans had an effect on climate change.</div><div>WHAT SHE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>As head of E.P.A.’s air office, Ms. Idsal now oversees decisions on regulating air pollution and climate change, including whether to impose controls on coal-fired power plants.</div><div>
</div><div>Alexandra Dapolito-Dunn</div><div>Head of chemical safety</div><div>Former attorney and law professor at nonpartisan state environmental organizations and universities. Now oversees chemical regulations at the E.P.A.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Ms. Dapolito-Dunn spent several years working in nonpartisan organizations focused on the environment, including as executive director and general counsel for the Environmental Council of the States and the Association of Clean Water Administrators.</div><div>WHAT SHE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Under Ms. Dapolito-Dunn, the E.P.A. has decided not to ban chlorpyrifos, a pesticide linked to impaired brain development in children, and has proposed new restrictions on asbestos that agency scientists said did not go far enough.</div><div>
</div><div>Nancy B. Beck</div><div>Principal deputy head of chemical safety</div><div>Previously worked in the chemical industry against regulations of chemicals. Now in charge of chemical regulations (though currently in a temporary position at the White House).</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Ms. Beck ran the E.P.A.’s chemical office for the first two years of the Trump administration but is now temporarily at the White House Council of Economic Advisors. Before joining the E.P.A., she served at the American Chemistry Council, which lobbies to weaken regulations on chemicals.</div><div>WHAT SHE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>At the E.P.A., Ms. Beck pushed to weaken rules on toxic chemicals like the pesticide chlorpyrifos, as well as the review process for other toxic substances like the paint stripper ingredient methylene chloride. David Fischer is filling in for her at the E.P.A. while she advises the White House.</div><div>
</div><div>David Fischer</div><div>Deputy head of chemical safety</div><div>Previously helped chemical companies navigate chemical safety laws. Now oversees federal implementation of chemical safety laws.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Fischer held several positions over a 10-year span at the American Chemistry Council, including serving as senior director in the chemical products and technology division. He later joined a public relations firm.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Fischer has stepped into Ms. Beck’s previous E.P.A. role during her temporary move to the White House, and is now a top policy adviser on chemical regulations.</div><div>
</div><div>David Ross</div><div>Head of the water office</div><div>Previously sued to block an E.P.A. clean water rule. Now runs the Office of Water.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Ross represented industry clients like the American Farm Bureau against E.P.A. water regulations before entering state government. As an assistant attorney general of Wyoming, he challenged the E.P.A.’s clean water rule.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Ross has led efforts to restrict the scope of the Clean Water Act and to weaken an Obama-era clean water regulation known as the Waters of the United States.</div><div>
</div><div>Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta</div><div>Head of research and development</div><div>A career E.P.A. scientist, who now serves as E.P.A.’s top science adviser.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Dr. Orme-Zavaleta has been with the E.P.A. since 1981, working with Republican and Democratic administrations on a range of issues including water pollution and chemical exposure risk.</div><div>WHAT SHE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Her office is in charge of a proposed new regulation that would restrict the use of scientific studies the E.P.A. can use when creating or modifying pollution regulations.</div><div>
</div><div>David Dunlap</div><div>Deputy head of science policy</div><div>Former chemicals expert for Koch Industries. Now oversees federal research on toxic chemicals that will determine if more regulations are required.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Dunlap previously served as a policy chief at Koch Industries, focusing on water and chemical management. Earlier, he served as a vice president of the Chlorine Institute, which represents producers and distributors.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Dunlap is the top political deputy overseeing E.P.A.’s pollution and toxic chemical research at the Office of Research and Development. Mr. Dunlap helps to review chemicals to determine if they require new restrictions. He has recused himself from work on one particular chemical, formaldehyde, because Koch Industries is a major formaldehyde producer</div><div>Department of the Interior</div><div>
</div><div>The Interior Department manages more than 500 million acres of land and 1.7 billion acres of ocean floor, as well as the plants and animals living there and the oil, gas and other minerals that lie below. Under the Trump administration, the agency has removed regulatory obstacles to fossil fuel development.</div><div>
</div><div>David Bernhardt</div><div>Head of the Department of the Interior</div><div>Former lobbyist for oil, gas and farming interests. Now oversees all federal land and natural resource use.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Former lawyer and lobbyist for oil and gas companies including Halliburton, Cobalt International Energy, Samson Resources, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Bernhardt leads the Interior Department, overseeing millions of acres of federal land and waterways. Under his tenure, the agency has weakened protections for endangered species, rolled back regulations on methane fought by the oil and gas industries, and weakened protections for fish in order to divert water to California farmers.</div><div>
</div><div>Douglas W. Domenech</div><div>Oversees oceans, coasts and American territories</div><div>Previously worked as an oil lobbyist and on lawsuits to weaken environmental policies. Now oversees policy decisions over oceans and in U.S. territories.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Domenech was the director of the Fueling Freedom Project of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a Koch-funded group that promotes fossil fuels. Before that, he was the secretary of natural resources in Virginia, where he supported oil drilling off the state’s coastline.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Domenech has been closely involved in most major policy decisions at the Interior Department, including scaling back national monuments in Utah and reversing endangered species protections.</div><div>
</div><div>William P. Pendley</div><div>Acting chief, Bureau of Land Management</div><div>A conservative attorney who has advocated selling off public lands. Now oversees 250 million acres of public lands.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Pendley has long been critical of public lands and the environmental movement, and has compared government regulation to tyranny. He once compared climate change to a “unicorn” because “neither exists.”</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Pendley is in charge of all federal public land across 12 western states, and decides whether or not to grant leases to fossil fuel companies for oil exploration and mining. He currently is overseeing the move of the Bureau of Land Management’s headquarters to Colorado.</div><div>
</div><div>Scott A. Angelle</div><div>Head of offshore safety and enforcement</div><div>Previously opposed former President Barack Obama's halt on drilling after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Now oversees safety measures put in place after disasters.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>As Louisiana’s secretary of natural resources, Mr. Angelle pushed to lift the Obama administration’s moratorium on Gulf Coast drilling imposed after BP spill. Shortly after being appointed to the Interior department, he told a group of oil and gas executives, “Help is on the way.”</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Angelle has overseen efforts to roll back Obama-era offshore drilling regulations, including safety requirements on blow-out preventers and real-time monitoring.</div><div>
</div><div>Aurelia Skipwith</div><div>Director of Fish and Wildlife Services</div><div>Previously worked for the agrochemical giant Monsanto. Now oversees the recovery of threatened and endangered species.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Ms. Skipwith co-founded, with her fiancé, and served as general counsel of an agricultural consulting company, AVC Global. She previously worked for agricultural companies like Monsanto.</div><div>WHAT SHE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>The Fish and Wildlife service oversees most wildlife protection in the United States as well as 150 million acres of land conservation and development projects on the nation’s wildlife refuges.</div><div>
</div><div>James F. Reilly</div><div>Director, U.S. Geological Survey</div><div>Used to be a geologist for an oil and gas company. Now he oversees an initiative to restrict the way the government uses climate change models.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Dr. Reilly worked for 15 years as the chief geologist for Enserch Exploration, an oil and gas company based in Dallas. He also worked at NASA and was an astronaut for 13 years.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Dr. Reilly has ordered that scientific assessments from the U.S. Geological Survey focus on climate models that project the effects of climate change through 2040, rather than 2100, which had been the previous standard. Federal scientists say that would be misleading because the major impacts of current emissions may be felt after 2040.</div><div>
</div><div>Daniel Jorjani</div><div>Solicitor of the Department of the Interior</div><div>Formerly an adviser to organizations led by the Koch brothers. Now a top attorney overseeing President Trump’s policy of encouraging fossil fuel production and development.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Jorjani served in the Interior Department under George W. Bush, and then worked for three different groups connected to the billionaire brothers Charles G. and David H. Koch, who have spent millions opposing efforts to fight climate change.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Jorjani provides legal advice and oversees legal opinions regarding all Interior Department regulatory policies, including the decision to end criminal penalties for the “incidental” killing of migratory birds in the course of business activity.</div><div>Department of Energy</div><div>
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</div><div>In addition to overseeing the country’s nuclear arsenal, the Energy Department helps to develop energy from fossil fuels as well as renewables like wind, solar and geothermal power. Under the Trump administration it has rolled back energy efficiency measures for appliances and light bulbs, and promoted the export of coal and liquified natural gas.</div><div>
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</div><div>Dan Brouillette</div><div>Head of the Department of Energy</div><div>Former lobbyist for the insurance industry and for Ford Motor Company. Now secretary of the Department of Energy.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Brouilette was senior vice president of the United Services Automobile Association and at the Ford Motor Company. He has lobbied for the Business Software Alliance, Lockheed Martin, Time Warner, Entergy & Verizon.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>Mr. Brouillette oversees the country’s nuclear energy stockpile and the national laboratories conducting energy research and development. In December, one of his first acts as secretary was to roll back Obama-era energy efficiency standards for light bulbs.</div><div>
</div><div>Neil Chatterjee</div><div>Chairman, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission</div><div>Formerly coordinated opposition to climate regulations as an energy adviser for Republican Senator Mitch McConnell. Now serves as the country’s top energy regulator.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>As the energy policy adviser to Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, Mr. Chatterjee helped fight regulations Mr. McConnell considered cumbersome, like the Clean Power Plan rules restricting coal-fired power plants.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission regulates the interstate transmission of electricity, natural gas and oil. Recently the commission ruled that wind, solar and other clean energy sources can be assessed a surcharge when bidding into the country’s largest power market, a move aimed at propping up fossil fuels and potentially discouraging new investments in renewable power.</div><div>
</div><div>Daniel Simmons</div><div>Assistant Head of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy</div><div>Used to work for an organization that called for the elimination of the Department of Energy’s office of energy efficiency and renewable energy. Now he runs that office.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>Mr. Simmons was vice president for policy at the Institute for Energy Research, which is funded by fossil fuel interests, including Koch Industries. He held the same position at the group’s advocacy arm, the American Energy Alliance, which once called for the elimination of the office of energy efficiency and renewable energy.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>The department’s mission is to help support the development of clean, renewable and energy efficiency technologies and support a global clean-energy economy.</div><div>Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs</div><div>
</div><div>Any agency that writes a regulation — or rolls back a regulation — works with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. This obscure but powerful division of the White House Office of Management and Budget performs cost-benefit analyses on all regulatory actions before they are finalized. Some examples include the E.P.A.’s plan to weaken regulations on coal plants and the Interior Department’s plans to loosen protections for endangered species.</div><div>
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</div><div>Paul Ray</div><div>Head of Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs</div><div>Former corporate attorney who represented Exxon and other companies that fought environmental regulations. Now he runs the agency that oversees every regulation.</div><div>
</div><div>PAST LIFE</div><div>As a corporate attorney, Mr. Ray’s clients included chemical, oil and gas, and pharmaceutical companies as well as the paper and wood industry.</div><div>WHAT HE GETS TO DECIDE</div><div>He will review every major regulation that the Trump administration proposes, and is responsible for carrying out Mr. Trump’s executive order directing agencies to repeal two regulations for each significant one they issue.</div><div>=</div></div><div><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">omg</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">please join the<b> U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in welcoming David Legates as its new as deputy assistant secretary of Commerce </b>for observation and prediction. According to&nbsp;<em style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/09/climate-change-denialist-given-top-role-major-us-science-agency" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: 700;">Science</a></em>, Legates is a geography professor at the University of Delaware, with "a long history of questioning fundamental climate science and has suggested that an outcome of burning fossil fuels would be a more habitable planet for humans."</font></p><div align="center" id="boingboing_728x90_468x60_300x250_LongForm_InContent_1" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><blockquote class="wp-block-quote" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-left: 4px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); padding-left: 1em; margin: 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Legates has spent his career denying consensus climate science while elevating the work of fringe researchers and industry-funded scientists. He has claimed that addressing climate change would do more harm than good, and he has said pumping more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere would benefit humanity.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">When testifying before the House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee last year, Legates blamed natural variations for the unprecedented level of warming that scientists say is caused by the release of carbon dioxide from human activity.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Climate has always changed, and weather is always variable, due to complex, powerful natural forces," Legates said. "No efforts to stabilize the climate can possibly be successful."</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Legates has also said that teaching children about climate change was an effort "to satisfy the climate change fearmongering agenda that pervades our society today."</font></p></blockquote><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Bernhardt runs DOI pendejo BLM; Wheeler runs EPA</b></font></div><div>
</div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">i get bernhaRDT and wheeler confused, but both key in suicidal dereg; both LAWYERS AND LOBBYISTS; BOTH savvy enough to use levers of power and not get busted for corruption like zinke and pruitt? pendejo? jorjani perjury seems like a long shot?</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">bern: credentials</font></p><ul style="margin: 1.5em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 30px;"><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">J.D., Law, The George Washington University Law School (1994)</span>.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/david-bernhardt#s1" style="text-decoration-line: none;">[1]</a></font></li><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="caps">B.A.</span>&nbsp;political science, University of Northern Colorado (1990).<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/david-bernhardt#s2" style="text-decoration-line: none;">&nbsp;[2]</a></font></li><li><h1 style="line-height: 1.2em; margin-top: 0.75em; margin-bottom: 0.75em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">WheeleR</font></h1><ul style="margin: 1.5em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 30px;"><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="caps">MBA</span>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/george-mason-university" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">George Mason University</a>&nbsp;(1999).<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/andrew-wheeler#s1" style="text-decoration-line: none;">&nbsp;[1]</a></font></li><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span class="caps">JD</span>, Washington University in St. Louis School of Law (1990)</span>.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/andrew-wheeler#s1" style="text-decoration-line: none;">[1]</a></font></li><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="caps">BA</span>, Case Western Reserve University (1987).&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/andrew-wheeler#s1" style="text-decoration-line: none;">[1]</a></font></li></ul></li></ul><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p></div></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div>
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</font></div><div><a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/uwag-and-uswag-the-secretive-utility-groups-that-target-epa-rules/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.energyandpolicy.org/uwag-and-uswag-the-secretive-utility-groups-that-target-epa-rules/</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">may 2019</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">matt kasper</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div class="entry-content" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: top;"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span style="font-weight: inherit;">The&nbsp;</span><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label=" (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/utility-air-regulatory-group/" target="blank" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Utility Air Regulatory Group</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;</span><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label=" (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/05/10/epa-air-chief-3238271" target="blank" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">announced</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;on Friday that its remaining members had decided to disband the embattled project after more than 40 years. UARG had been an unincorporated group of utilities represented by lawyers at&nbsp;</span><b>Hunton</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;Andrews Kurth that fought against clean air standards.</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">But while the utilities may have dissolved UARG, the same corporations still have other “U Groups” that exist to attack EPA’s enforcement of the nation’s environmental laws. Just as utilities used UARG to target the Clean Air Act, they have the Utility Solid Waste Activities Group (USWAG) and the Utility Water Act Group (UWAG) to attack EPA’s enforcement of the Clean Water Act and other laws that utilities have long perceived as thorns in their sides.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">USWAG is represented by lawyers at Venable LLP. Attorneys from&nbsp;</b><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">Hunton&nbsp;</b><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Andrews Kurth, the same firm that housed UARG, represent the members of UWAG.</b><span style="font-weight: inherit; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">&nbsp;Both U-groups are set up similarly to UARG: unincorporated, voluntary, ad-hoc coalitions that do not disclose individual utility members. USWAG has been a party in 88 lawsuits since the early 1990s while UWAG has been a party in 99 cases since 2000, according to the Public Access to Court Electronic Records.</span></font></p><h4 style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: 400; margin: 0px 0px 25.2344px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; clear: both; line-height: 1.2;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Utility Solid Waste Activities Group, Utility Water Act Group targeting Obama-era rules; also subsidized by utility customers</font></span></h4><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">UARG’s utility members faced intense scrutiny in recent months since&nbsp;<a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/20/epa-air-pollution-regulations-wehrum-1191258" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Politico obtained and published</a>&nbsp;confidential documents that outlined goals for a meeting of UARG’s policy committee to attack Obama-era clean air and public health rules.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The spotlight brightened when leading Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee&nbsp;<a href="https://energycommerce.house.gov/newsroom/press-releases/ec-leaders-launch-investigation-of-secretive-front-group-uarg-and-its-ties" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">sent letters</a>&nbsp;to several member-utility CEOs asking for information about EPA air official Bill Wehrum’s relationship with UARG and its member companies</b><b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">&nbsp;Wehrum was an attorney at Hunton and represented UARG. Congress&nbsp;</span></b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);"><b><a href="https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/release/democrats-call-for-investigation-of-top-epa-officials-role-in-reversing-enforcement-position" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">is investigating</a>&nbsp;how he and another former Hunton lawyer now at the EPA, David Harlow</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">, have helped reverse the agency’s position in a major enforcement action to favor a client of their former law firm – DTE Energy.</span></span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><b>The Congressional probe into UARG requested that the utilities state whether they had forced their customers to fund their annual contributions to the collective legal effort</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">. Journalists and consumer advocates also pressed individual utilities to answer the question posed from the members of Congress.</span><b>&nbsp;Several utilities, including&nbsp;<a href="https://insideepa.com/daily-news/utility-aep-tells-house-democrats-ratepayers-fund-uarg-dues" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">American Electric Power</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/aps-quits-lobbyist-group-ethics-probe-epa-officials-srp-tep-11273451" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Arizona Public Service</a>, and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/aps-quits-lobbyist-group-ethics-probe-epa-officials-srp-tep-11273451" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Tucson Electric Power</a>, admitted that they force their customers to fund UARG expenses and therefore the legal challenges to the Clean Air Act.</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;Others, such as&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.stltoday.com/business/local/congressional-probe-looks-at-lobbying-group-funded-by-ameren-other/article_4c61b33d-b7fd-5e4c-9a08-d26a0d3a8486.html" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Ameren</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">,&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2019/04/11/house-panel-probes-dte-utility-support-industry-groups/3435466002/" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">DTE Energy</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">,&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060169943" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Dominion</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">, and&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060169943" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Duke Energy</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;did not provide details about the source of UARG funding.</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Rate case filings reveal that many utilities similarly force their customers to fund their attacks on EPA’s ability to enforce the Clean Water Act via USWAG and UWAG</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">&nbsp;In 2017, the Minnesota Office of the Attorney General&nbsp;</span></span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5770321-Minnesota-Attorney-General-Direct-Testimony.html#document/p52/a486802" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">argued</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">&nbsp;that customers of Minnesota Power shouldn’t foot the utility’s membership bill for both USWAG and UWAG</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">. Missouri Public Service Commission Staff&nbsp;</span></span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3461233-MO-PSC-Statement-of-Positions-EEI-Dues.html#document/p4/a353010" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">explained</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;that Ameren shouldn’t bill its customers $96,010 for UWAG annual dues and $47,163 for USWAG. And in&nbsp;</span><b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">November of 2018, the Kentucky Office of the Attorney General&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5765622-Kentucky-Attorney-General-Data-Requests-Kentucky.html#document/p69/a486078" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">attempted to prevent</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;Louisville Gas & Electric and Kentucky Utilities customers from paying the $68,175 for USWAG annual dues and $109,501 for UWAG.</span></b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-weight: inherit;">In a</span><b>&nbsp;2016 Arizona Public Service rate case, the Residential Utility Consumer Office (RUCO)</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3625848-RUCO-Filing-APS-EEI-Dues.html#document/p37/a483616" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">described</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;the U-groups as “purely voluntary, many of which are political in nature, and may not be necessary for the provision of utility services.”</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span style="font-weight: inherit;">Earlier this month,&nbsp;</span><a href="https://insideepa.com/daily-news/5th-circuit-judges-appear-split-suit-over-delay-utility-effluent-rule" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">UWAG attorneys were in court</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;to join the defense of the Trump administration’s two-year delay of Obama’s Effluent Limitations Guidelines (ELG) rule. Two years ago,&nbsp;</span><b>Hunton</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;attorneys representing UWAG&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-03/documents/letter_to_epa_submitting_petition_for_reconsideration_w_exhibits-c_508.pdf" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">petitioned the Trump EPA</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;to reconsider the ELG rule. Under President Obama, the EPA finalized an update to the rule as it hadn’t been updated since the early 1980s. The rule exists to limit the wastewater that power plants can discharge in waterways.&nbsp;</span><b>That&nbsp;<a href="https://eelp.law.harvard.edu/2018/07/power-plant-effluent-limits/" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">wastewater includes</a>&nbsp;arsenic, lead, mercury, selenium, chromium, and cadmium.</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><b>USWAG attorneys, meanwhile, have&nbsp;<a href="https://eelp.law.harvard.edu/2017/12/coal-ash-rule/" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">targeted a coal ash rule</a>,&nbsp;</b></span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>which the Obama Administration proposed in 2010 following the largest toxic waste spill in U.S. history at a Tennessee Valley Authority power plant in Kingston. One billion gallons of coal ash sludge destroyed 300 acres and dozens of homes</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">. The rule established a set of requirements for the safe disposal of coal ash from coal-fired power plants. Similar to the ELG rule,&nbsp;</span></span><a href="https://eelp.law.harvard.edu/2017/12/coal-ash-rule/" style="font-weight: inherit; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">USWAG was quick to petition</a><span style="font-weight: inherit; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;the Trump EPA to reconsider parts of the coal ash rule. In September 2017, then-EPA administrator Scott Pruitt&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/sites/www.sierraclub.org/files/blog/Signed%20CCR%20Petition%20Response2017-09-13-155129.pdf" style="font-weight: inherit; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">announced</a><span style="font-weight: inherit; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;that it will review parts of the rule that USWAG addressed in their petition.</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.4em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><span style="font-weight: inherit;">Ten years after the Kingston spill that triggered the rule which USWAG has fought to undermine,&nbsp;</span><b>400 workers who cleaned up the spill have been sickened. Another 40 died,</b><span style="font-weight: inherit;">&nbsp;according to a tally maintained by the&nbsp;</span><a href="https://www.knoxnews.com/story/news/crime/2019/05/03/workplace-safety-rally-kingston-coal-ash-workers/3632667002/" style="font-weight: inherit; box-sizing: border-box; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; border-top-style: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-bottom-style: solid; border-left-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 209, 224); border-left-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out 0s;">Knoxville News Sentinel</a><span style="font-weight: inherit;">.</span></font></p></div><div class="entry-meta" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: top; display: inline-block; width: 841.203px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><ul class="meta-list" style="box-sizing: border-box; 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border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; display: inline-block;">Posted in:</span>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/category/utilities/" rel="category tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">Utilities</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/category/utilities/utility-air-regulatory-group/" rel="category tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">Utility Air Regulatory Group</a>&nbsp;</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></li><li class="meta-tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 0px 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: top; display: inline;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; display: inline-block;">Tagged in:</span>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/tag/uarg/" rel="tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">UARG</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/tag/utility-air-regulatory-group/" rel="tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">Utility Air Regulatory Group</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/tag/utility-solid-waste-activities-group/" rel="tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">Utility Solid Waste Activities Group</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/tag/utility-water-act-group/" rel="tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">Utility Water Act Group</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.energyandpolicy.org/tag/uwag/" rel="tag" style="box-sizing: border-box; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration-line: none;">UWAG</a></li></ul></div></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">&nbsp;=</font></p><p><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?admin=George+W.+Bush&id=9">https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?admin=George+W.+Bush&id=9</a></p><p>
</p><p>tool</p></div></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">guk --> desmog 5/20</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>...fossil fuel companies have taken at least $50 million in taxpayer money they probably won’t have to pay back,&nbsp;</b>according to a review of coronavirus aid meant for struggling small businesses by the investigative research group Documented and the&nbsp;Guardian.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A total of $28 million is going to three coal mining companies, all with ties to Trump officials, bolstering a dying American industry and a fuel that scientists insist world leaders must shift away from to avoid the&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">worst</a>&nbsp;of the climate&nbsp;crisis.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The other $22 million is being paid out to oil and gas services and equipment providers and other firms that work with drillers and coal&nbsp;miners.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Melinda Pierce, the legislative director for the Sierra Club, said: “The federal money Congress appropriated should be going to help small businesses and frontline workers struggling as a result of the pandemic, not the corporate polluters whose struggles are a result of failing business practices and existed long before&nbsp;<span class="caps">COVID</span>-19 entered the public&nbsp;lexicon.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>More than 40 Democratic lawmakers have&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/492991-democrats-say-coronavirus-stimulus-should-not-bail-out-fossil-fuel?utm_campaign=Bailout&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=87229767&hsenc=p2ANqtz-T0usMF1JIzmKzk4V6u3gpSocO0p8_Z8R4nHhJJRsSDTiCqDZi4fHWH2Q-H2zOK-oLJ_8SgiC8DYAyd7_8zP4kz_P_9w&hsmi=87229767" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">argued</a>&nbsp;that fossil fuel companies should not get any assistance under the coronavirus aid&nbsp;package.</b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Some Democrats have also warned the forgivable loans being made under Congress’ Paycheck Protection Program could be a transparency&nbsp;disaster.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Banks and lending institutions are distributing the money, so the government says it cannot track recipients in real time. The loans revealed have been made public only through news reports and securities filings by publicly traded companies, although the Federal Reserve has&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/23/fed-to-disclose-bailouts-monthly-204953" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">committed</a>&nbsp;to issuing monthly&nbsp;reports.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">So far, it’s clear the program is not working as intended. The funds are aimed at helping small businesses to keep paying their employees and covering other recurring expenses during the economic downturn. But they have been exploited by large companies forced to return the money amid a public outcry, including the Los Angeles Lakers, Shake Shack, and Ruth’s Chris Steak&nbsp;House.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The industry aid comes as the Trump administration is reportedly considering a broader&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-29/trump-said-to-be-briefed-on-emergency-aid-for-oil-industry?utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_content=politics&cmpid%3D=socialflow-twitter-politics&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">bailout</a>&nbsp;for oil and gas corporations, which were&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/business/energy-environment/coronavirus-oil-companies-debt.html?utm_campaign=Bailout&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=87229767&hsenc=p2ANqtz-T0usMF1JIzmKzk4V6u3gpSocO0p8_Z8R4nHhJJRsSDTiCqDZi4fHWH2Q-H2zOK-oLJ_8SgiC8DYAyd7_8zP4kz_P_9w&hsmi=87229767" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">already under pressure</a>&nbsp;before the coronavirus and have watched oil prices&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/apr/30/covid-19-crisis-demand-fossil-fuels-iea-renewable-electricity" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">nosedive</a>&nbsp;because of a global price war and low demand for gasoline. The&nbsp;<span class="caps">U.S.</span>&nbsp;government could make loans to oil and gas companies, essentially making taxpayers investors in the&nbsp;industry.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The Federal Reserve on Thursday also announced changes to its lending rules that could help indebted petroleum&nbsp;firms.</b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>The idea that oil workers are getting a paycheck is great,” said Jamie Henn, a spokesman for the Stop the Money Pipeline campaign who co-founded the environment group 350.org. “The worry is that the money’s going to the top and not going to filter&nbsp;down.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The $50 million already paid to fossil fuel companies is a small fraction of the the $2.1 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, known as the Cares Act. But the total assistance to the industry is likely much larger than can currently be tallied and will continue to&nbsp;grow.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Environmental advocates and oversight experts tracking the funds say it’s impossible to count how much of the money will assist fossil fuels, including because some firms provide services across multiple&nbsp;industries.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>All of this is voluntary disclosures by the companies,” said Jesse Coleman, a senior researcher with Documented. “No matter what, it’s going to be an incomplete picture of what’s going&nbsp;on.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Coleman said in many cases the fossil fuel companies getting aid have made bad investments and “now they’re going to come crawling hat in hand and say: look at what the coronavirus did to&nbsp;us.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Among the coronavirus aid recipients is</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">&nbsp;<b>Hallador Coal, an Indiana-based coal mining&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1062934367" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">company</a>&nbsp;that hired Donald Trump’s former environment chief Scott Pruitt as a lobbyist.</b>&nbsp;</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);"><b style="">company’s former&nbsp;</b><a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/04/21/this-coal-company-with-ties-trump-administration-just-got-10-million-small-business-loan/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><b>government relations</b></a><b style="">&nbsp;director now works at the energy department</b></span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">.&nbsp;Hallador is taking $10 million to fund two months of payroll and other&nbsp;expenses.</span></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Coal mining company&nbsp;<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">Rhino Resources, which was formerly run by Trump’s Mine Safety and Health Administration head, David Zatezalo, is receiving $10&nbsp;million.</span></b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Coal firm Ramaco Resources, whose<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">&nbsp;<span class="caps">CEO</span>, Randy Atkins, is on the energy department’s&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.energy.gov/fe/national-coal-council" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">National Coal Council</a>, is getting $8.4&nbsp;million.</span></b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The&nbsp;<span class="caps">U.S.</span>&nbsp;coal industry has been in steep decline, driven out of the market by cheap natural gas and environmental concerns. Trump campaigned on putting coal miners back to work, and his agencies have unsuccessfully explored ways to bail out coal companies, which are seeing their&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/latest-news-headlines/us-coal-mining-employment-hits-new-low-at-the-end-of-2019-may-go-lower-in-2020-57173047" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">lowest employment levels</a>&nbsp;in modern history. The Trump administration has also rescinded nearly all of the environment and climate protections the fossil fuel industry has&nbsp;opposed.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Fossil fuel companies can also take advantage of tax benefits under the coronavirus legislation, including deferring payment of social security and medicare&nbsp;taxes.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b><u>The Missouri-based Peabody&nbsp;<a data-component="auto-linked-tag" data-link-name="auto-linked-tag" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/energy" target="blank">Energy</a>&nbsp;coal company has said it will speed up collecting an alternative minimum tax refund of $24 million to 2020 and defer $18 million&nbsp;of owed&nbsp;taxes.</u></b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="caps">U.S.</span>&nbsp;taxpayers already subsidize the fossil fuel industry at roughly $20 billion a year, according to&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.eesi.org/papers/view/fact-sheet-fossil-fuel-subsidies-a-closer-look-at-tax-breaks-and-societal-costs" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">conservative estimates</a>.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Center for International Environmental Law has&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.ciel.org/reports/pandemic-crisis-systemic-decline/?utm_campaign=Bailout&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=87229767&hsenc=p2ANqtz-T0usMF1JIzmKzk4V6u3gpSocO0p8_Z8R4nHhJJRsSDTiCqDZi4fHWH2Q-H2zOK-oLJ_8SgiC8DYAyd7_8zP4kz_P_9w&hsmi=87229767" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">accused</a>&nbsp;the oil, gas, and plastics industries of “exploiting the crisis by aggressively lobbying for massive bailouts and special privileges in a desperate attempt to revive an oil and gas industry already in&nbsp;decline.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis argues that federal lending to the oil and gas sector would be “a&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://ieefa.org/ieefa-commentary-federal-lending-to-the-oil-and-gas-sector-would-be-a-complete-waste-of-money/?utm_campaign=Bailout&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=87229767&hsenc=p2ANqtz-T0usMF1JIzmKzk4V6u3gpSocO0p8_Z8R4nHhJJRsSDTiCqDZi4fHWH2Q-H2zOK-oLJ_8SgiC8DYAyd7_8zP4kz_P_9w&hsmi=87229767" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">complete waste of money</a>,”&nbsp;because it wouldn’t fix the industry’s underlying financial&nbsp;problems.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Oil industry lobbyists have pushed for changes at the Federal Reserve to let companies with large amounts of debt use its Main Street Lending Program and borrow to pay off existing&nbsp;loans.</b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In an April 15 letter to the Federal Reserve, the oil trade group the Independent Petroleum Association of America asked for the new provisions, saying “oil and natural gas producers are not looking for a government handout; they are seeking a bridge to help survive this economic&nbsp;disruption.”</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Environmental advocates say the move would disproportionately benefit&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://twitter.com/apark/status/1255914801441705984" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">small and mid-sized oil and gas companies</a>, such as Occidental Petroleum, which has&nbsp;<a data-link-name="in body link" href="https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/e2t/c/M4WN9xSByy8W2h4c4y3TlKXr0/W2Zlk4k5NGGgsW2xJsm98R3pKK0/5/f18dQhb0S66Y2dYTs8V1xQ8M5xzGqPN1gCHKyBK5sNW6vWH7v3v46r4W40nP_C6SbbdbW1q1fwy1Xx3P3W210tVf6gq8SnW1phqS04NXDv6N1g_P_Kq0G-3W143krb98NYbyW5Q0yV83rs3ZKW5ZZhRx535GDQW5NlQM82CfYgTW7rGCsQ333KNkW6p5dZb5p5g84W2cWfwL9cjpVqW8Hk6MP8mjKrgW8PFzpG1NFxTlW2ppCHj2CXV3gW5VrFgx8pjr8HW2FNTDy5v2W-hW6svxgj4j7rspN1dvnVyFM9DtVRhfls4YRnx0N8bfdw14KdLRN3vK2m-5gg4mW8gwgt08_6wmMN2jpt05YZ8GcW6HKd_Z4JK7m2W37TVHz2MdTBRW6JtfKm74dqlXN24PWd5wjt01Vs423Y4DkPCGVPblJd1ZK42qW6gHRc42PmGhWV7nZyS3kfyHYW5wGmbf7SDyKQW2N92b45wJyVMW3Pj8tr4ngG44W30BhtN1xPKBvN3d7CJsmsLGZN1K0hcfX3xrFW5n0r1b8w-r1ZW2y_t-w162fvVW6-tCBh7BYyz3W4RnC597hc3h6W8rLJvW25NhLPN8xP9C81x5zVf8h0_LF03" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">nearly $80 billion in liabilities</a>&nbsp;on its balance&nbsp;sheet.</font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Graham Steele, who directs the corporations and society initiative at Stanford Graduate School of Business, called the situation the “<b><u>classic disaster scenario where an opportunistic administration and industry is taking advantage of a&nbsp;crisis.”</u></b></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>And by the way, these are industries driving climate change. It’s both a bad financial proposition of the Fed and for taxpayers and a bad situation for the&nbsp;planet.”</font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">---</font></div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">OMFG</font></div><div><div>
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</font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/that-1970s-scourge-acid-rain-is-back/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/that-1970s-scourge-acid-rain-is-back/</a></div><div>
</div><div><div class="mag-header" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 19px; padding: 0px; position: relative;"><h3 class="magcat-titlte entry-title" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; letter-spacing: 1px;"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/that-1970s-scourge-acid-rain-is-back/" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer; display: block; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 1.4;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000" style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">1970s scourge</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"> acid rain is back</span></font></a></h3><div class="grid-post-box-meta mag-meta" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 7px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><span class="author-italic author vcard" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/sarah-okeson/" title="Posts by Sarah Okeson" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Sarah Okeson</a>&nbsp;/&nbsp;<a href="https://www.alternet.org/author/dc-report/" title="Posts by DC Report" class="author url fn" rel="author" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">DC Report</a></font></span></div></div><div class="mag-excerpt entry-content" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Starting in the 1970s acid rain turned hundreds of lakes and streams in Adirondack Park in upstate New York so acidic that fish could not survive. Acid rain can be…</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">no lnx</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">That 1970s scourge acid rain is back</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Written by Sarah Okeson /&nbsp;<b>DC Report&nbsp;</b>October 26, 2019</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Starting in the 1970s acid rain turned hundreds of lakes and streams in Adirondack Park in upstate New York so acidic that fish could not survive. Acid rain can be so toxic that it etches paint off cars.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">The good news: some naturally reproducing trout were recently found in one body of water in the Adirondacks. Lake Colden had been without such naturally grown fish for 32 years. This revival comes after decades of government work to reduce the toxic air emissions that cause acid rain.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">The bad news: Team Trump seems determined to create a comeback for acid rain. That would mean 500 other Adirondack ponds and lakes would continue without naturally breeding fish. Worse, some of the sprawling park’s 2,300 other bodies of water might also become too toxic for other wildlife such as crayfish, salamanders and frogs. And because acid rain leaches aluminum in the soil it also kills trees.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">For people in the Northeast, it would also mean more asthma and heart disease as people breathe in air laced with greater amounts of sulfur dioxide, a toxic gas that causes acid rain.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>The Trump EPA wants to squash Obama era rules that would force owners of electric power plants to clean up their toxic wastes.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">To understand how Team Trump helps polluters and hurts everyone else, consider the</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">&nbsp;coal-burning Martin Lake Power Plant in east Texas. It spews more sulfur dioxide than any other power plant in America. Last year it spit out 56,198 tons of sulfur dioxide, a 54% increase over 2017.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Acid rain, then and now.(From Environmental Defense Fund)]</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Now the Trump EPA wants to squash Obama era rules that would force owners of this and other power plants to clean up their toxic wastes. Owners who escape these clean-up costs reap bigger profits. The rest of us pay the price: more sickness, shorter lives for some and hundreds of lakes with no fish surrounded by dying forests.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">To help polluters escape those costs the Trump administration puts executives, lawyers and lobbyists for polluting companies in charge of various units of the Environmental Protection Agency and other regulatory bodies. Instead of enforcement of clean air laws, Team Trump runs a protection racket for polluters.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Plant Owners Identified</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Texas power plant is owned by Luminant Generation Co., part of Vistra Energy. One of Vistra’s lobbying firms once employed a lawyer who was hired to head the Trump EPA air office. Vistra is one of nine politically connected polluters being scrutinized by Congressional investigators. In 2018 alone it gave more than $101,000 to members of Congress at a three-to-one ratio favoring Republicans.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">
</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><b>The lawyer was Bill Wehrum, who oversaw the Trump EPA’s air policy office until he resigned in June during a federal ethics investigation.&nbsp;</b>Previously Wehrum was a partner at&nbsp;<b>Hunton & Williams where he made $2.1 million</b>. That law firm is now known as Hunton Andrews Kurth. A Congressional report dubbed the law firm “industry’s secret pipeline to EPA.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Vistra Energy paid $140,000 in lobbying fees last year to Hunton Andrews Kurth.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Wehrum was accused of repeatedly violating his ethics pledge and legal duty to refrain from EPA matters involving his former clients</b>. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, known as CREW, in May filed a detailed 14-page complaint against Wehrum with the EPA’s acting inspector general.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Other big sulfur dioxide polluters include DTE Energy Co., represented by Hunton Andrews Kurth in a long battle with the EPA over pollution from its coal-fired power plant in Monroe</b>, Mich. David Harlow, attorney for the EPA Office of Air and Radiation, previously represented DTE for Hunton Andrews Kurth.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Lobbyists As Regulators</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>
</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">Soon after Harlow and Wehrum joined the EPA, the agency changed its position on a core issue in DTE’s case, adopting the company’s view.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">A slightly different pro-polluter tactic was adopted for the power plant in east Texas. With former lobbyists for polluters in charge, the EPA made a mistake during the Obama years when it declared that parts of two counties near the Martin Lake plant exceeded the standard for sulfur dioxide emissions.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Trump’s EPA now wants to say the two-county area is “unclassifiable.” That would allow the plant to continue spewing tons of toxic air.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Because of actions assisting polluters, environmentalists fear acid rain is back.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">While rain typically is slightly acidic with a pH reading of close to 6, acid rain is sometimes 3.2. That may not seem like much because pH is a scale. But acid rain can be more than 200 times more acidic than pollution-free rainfall.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Acid Rain Effects</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">EPA infographic]</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Today 500 of 2,800 lakes and ponds in Adirondack State Park cannot support the plants and aquatic life that once existed in them.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Worse, acid rain can cause people to develop asthma as they breathe in even small concentrations of sulfur dioxide and the tiny particles it can form in the air. And it’s deadly for trees, trout and turtles.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">“The numbers are going in the wrong direction,” said William Janeway, executive director of the Adirondack Council, about rising acidity in Northeast rainfall.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Adirondack, a state park, covers more than six million acres, making it bigger than the combined acreage of Yosemite, Yellowstone, Glacier, Grand Canyon and the Great Smokies National Parks.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;" /><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">When power plants in the heartland burn coal laced with sulfur the toxic waste goes up smokestacks. Prevailing winds that tend to blow eastward then carry pollution from these coal-burning power plants to the Northeast where much of it falls in rain that kills. Team Trump not only thinks that is fine, it wants more acid rain.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; font-style: italic;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">one lobbyist replaced by another:</font></div><div><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/raytheon-lobbyist-mark-esper-to-lead-pentagon"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/raytheon-lobbyist-mark-esper-to-lead-pentagon</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The&nbsp;Pentagon is going through a shakeup at the top, but the influence of major defense and aerospace companies holds firm.</font></div><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/rev_summary.php?id=80715" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Patrick Shanahan</a>, a former Boeing executive who served as acting secretary since February,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/18/us/politics/patrick-shanahan-defense-secretary.html" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">withdrew his nomination</a>&nbsp;and resigned from his Pentagon post Tuesday.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/rev_summary.php?id=70733" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Mark Esper</a>, current Secretary of the Army and a former&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/lobbyist.php?id=Y0000025575L&year=2017" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Raytheon lobbyist</a>, will serve as the new acting Secretary of Defense.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Esper worked as vice president of governmental relations for&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000000175" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Raytheon</a>&nbsp;from 2010 to 2017 before taking the Trump administration job. He was a registered lobbyist for more than a decade, representing the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000046462&year=2019" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Aerospace Industries Association of America</a>&nbsp;and then the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000019798&year=2009" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">U.S. Chamber of Commerce</a>&nbsp;before lobbying on behalf of the defense giant.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Esper has a distinguished&nbsp;<a href="https://taskandpurpose.com/army-secretary-mark-esper" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">military background</a>. Having served as a rifle platoon leader in the Gulf War, his battalion helped make up the “left hook” of 350,000 troops that drove Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Following his military service, Esper worked for Sen.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00005301&cycle=Career" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Chuck Hagel</a>&nbsp;(R-Neb.) and worked his way up to director for national security affairs for Senate Majority Leader&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/summary?cid=N00003147&cycle=2006" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Bill Frist</a>&nbsp;(R-Tenn.) before leaving for the private sector.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">During his time with Raytheon, Esper focused on providing input on&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/lobbyist_bills.php?id=Y0000025575L&year=2017" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">defense spending authorization bills</a>&nbsp;crucial to the company’s bottom line, working specifically on acquisition policy and missile systems&nbsp;<a href="https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/top-lobbyists/302782-top-lobbyists-2016-corporate" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">in 2016</a>. Raytheon posted record federal lobbying spending during Esper’s tenure, peaking in 2013 when it shelled out more than $7.6 million.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;" /><div style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; text-align: center;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Esper is&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/trump/lobbyists" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">one of many lobbyists</a>&nbsp;to take a spin through the revolving door into — and out of — the Trump administration. Other high profile examples include Environmental Protection Agency Administrator&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/rev_summary.php?id=70468" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Andrew Wheeler</a>, a former oil and gas lobbyist, and Federal Aviation Administer&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/rev_summary.php?id=77922" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Dan Elwell</a>, a former&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000067697&year=2019" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">American Airlines</a>&nbsp;lobbyist who has&nbsp;<a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/dan-elwell-current-faa-chief-coordinated-with-ex-lobbyist-colleagues-on-policy" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">communicated with his ex-colleagues</a>&nbsp;as a government official.</font><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The current Army undersecretary is&nbsp;<a href="https://dod.defense.gov/About/Biographies/Biography-View/Article/1267101/ryan-d-mccarthy/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Ryan D. McCarthy</a>, a combat veteran and former&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=d000000104" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Lockheed Martin</a>executive who worked on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As a former executive of a rival aerospace manufacturer, Shanahan raised eyebrows when he&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/25/politics/pentagon-gao-patrick-shanahan-f-35/index.html" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">criticized Lockheed Martin</a>&nbsp;over the F-35 fighter jet, which has been marred by setbacks and accidents but&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/04/too-big-to-fail-with-millions-invested-the-f-35/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">remains a focal point</a>&nbsp;for the Pentagon.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Shanahan worked for Boeing for three decades before joining the Pentagon to serve under then-Defense Secretary James Mattis.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Shanahan’s withdrawal came several hours after USA Today&nbsp;<a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/06/18/defense-secretary-fbi-patrick-shanahan-wife-domestic-violence-altercation/1470811001/" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-height: 1e+06px; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">revealed</a>&nbsp;that the FBI was “examining” a violent 2010 domestic dispute between Shanahan and then-wife Kimberley. President Donald Trump said Shanahan removed himself from consideration to spend more time with his family.</font></p><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>EPA Adopts Fringe Science Claim That Small Doses of Pollution Are Healthy 2/19 see Chemicals.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>omfg</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Sam Nickerson</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">EPA</a>) in April 2018&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/radiation-exposure-limits-epa-2609738084.html" target="self" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">proposed relaxing standards</a>&nbsp;related to how it assesses the effects of exposure to low levels of toxic&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/chemicals" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">chemicals</a>&nbsp;on public health.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Now, correspondence&nbsp;<a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-secret-science-20190219-story.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">obtained by the LA Times</a>&nbsp;revealed just how deeply involved industry lobbyists and a controversial, industry-funded toxicologist were in drafting the federal agency's proposal to scrap its current, protective approach to regulating toxin exposure.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The proposed change came just two weeks after a<b>&nbsp;top EPA official contacted toxicologist Ed Calabrese,</b>&nbsp;whose claim that low doses of carcinogens and radiation are healthy stressors akin to physical exercise that activate the body's repair mechanisms has been&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/6a573b6b020e453c90ecd5e84aa23f57" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">panned by more mainstream researchers</a>.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"I wanted to check to see if you might have some time in the next couple of days for a quick call to discuss a couple of items … "<b>&nbsp;EPA deputy assistant administrator Clint Woods</b>&nbsp;wrote to Calabrese.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The EPA's proposed regulation, signed by then-Administrator Scott Pruitt and published in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/04/30/2018-09078/strengthening-transparency-in-regulatory-science" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">the U.S. Government's Federal Register</a>, copied Calabrese's recommendations to Woods almost verbatim.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Calabrese, who was also quoted in the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-administrator-pruitt-proposes-rule-strengthen-science-used-epa-regulations" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">EPA's press release</a>&nbsp;for the proposal, celebrated the announcement in an email to former coal and tobacco lobbyist Steve Milloy, who served on President Donald Trump's EPA transition team.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"This is a major big time victory," Calabrese wrote. Milloy, who is also a Fox News commentator, replied that it was "YUGE."</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The EPA's proposal is a departure from its long-time "linear no-threshold" approach to regulating the study of toxins: once a substance is found to be harmful at one level, the danger applies at all levels. In other words, there can be no safe level of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/grand-canyon-radiation-exposure-2629386611.html" target="self" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">radiation exposure</a>.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Calabrese argues this approach is overly cautious and a financial detriment to industry. The new rule would require that regulators look at "various threshold models across the exposure range" for pollutants.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Low doses of otherwise toxic chemicals can be beneficial to human health in specific clinical situations, the LA Times noted, but experiments have produced mixed results and experts say it would be a risk to apply the findings to regulation for the general public.</span>
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"There is no way to control the dose a person gets from an industrial or agricultural chemical," David Jacobs, a professor of public health at the University of Minnesota, told the newspaper. "It's not being doled out in pills and monitored by a physician who can lower it if the patient isn't responding well."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The EPA has not announced a date for when it will make a decision on the rule proposal.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Health experts believe that if the EPA does adopt the rule, it could lead to wholesale changes to the agency's standards for regulating toxic waste,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pesticides" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">pesticides</a>, and air and water quality.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Industry has been pushing for this for a long time," George Washington University professor of environmental and occupational health David Michaels told the LA Times. "Not just the chemical industry, but the radiation and tobacco industries too."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Calabrese has long been connected to these industries and has received funding from tobacco firm R.J. Reynolds, Dow Chemical, Exxon Mobil and others, the LA Times reported.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/sites/default/files/attachments/calabrese_testimony_pdf.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-color: rgb(82, 149, 70); line-height: 1.5;">Calabrese's role in the EPA's proposal</a>&nbsp;illustrates how the Trump administration has pursued environmental policy recommendations from industry lobbyists based on research running counter to mainstream science.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">According to the LA Times, Calabrese first emailed Milloy about whether it would be possible to get the EPA to abandon the linear no-threshold model in September 2017, not even nine months after Trump was sworn into office.</font></p><p><b><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-pollution-heath-2629720153.html" style="%22opacity:1%3Bfill:%2315a5ea%3B%22" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" csvg="Csvg" height="%2213%22" width="%2213%22" version="%221.1%22" cg="Cg" transform="%22translate%28-36.467808%2C-258.39005%29%22%3E" cpath="Cpath" d="%22m40.55%2C263.9c0-0.6213%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C1.864%2C0.6213%2C3.107%2C1.864%2C3.728%2C3.728%2C0%2C0%2C0%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C0.6213-1.243-1.864-1.864-2.485-3.728-3.728z%22/%3E" c="C" g="g" e="E" rgb="rgb" padding-right="padding-right" px="px" xmlns="%22http://www.w3.org/2000/svg%22" xmlns:cc="%22http://creativecommons.org/ns%23%22" xmlns:data="data" xmlns:dc="%22http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/%22%3E" xmlns:rdf="%22http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns%23%22">EPA Adopts Fringe Science Claim That Small Doses of Pollution Are Healthy</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;2/19 see&nbsp;</span><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://rachelcarson-wiki.lt.ucsc.edu/mediawiki/index.php?title=Chemicals" style="%22opacity:1%3Bfill:%2315a5ea%3B%22" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" csvg="Csvg" height="%2213%22" width="%2213%22" version="%221.1%22" cg="Cg" transform="%22translate%28-36.467808%2C-258.39005%29%22%3E" cpath="Cpath" d="%22m40.55%2C263.9c0-0.6213%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C1.864%2C0.6213%2C3.107%2C1.864%2C3.728%2C3.728%2C0%2C0%2C0%2C0.6213-0.6213%2C0.6213-1.243-1.864-1.864-2.485-3.728-3.728z%22/%3E" c="C" g="g" e="E" rgb="rgb" padding-right="padding-right" px="px" xmlns="%22http://www.w3.org/2000/svg%22" xmlns:cc="%22http://creativecommons.org/ns%23%22" xmlns:data="data" xmlns:dc="%22http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/%22%3E" xmlns:rdf="%22http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns%23%22">Chemicals</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span></font></b></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">also kochsucker david dunlap water reg</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">swamp thing 2/19</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="" helvetica="Helvetica" neue="Neue" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb">Trump has announced he will nominate David Bernhardt as secretary of the Interior Department. Bernhardt, a former oil lobbyist, has been the agency’s acting secretary since Ryan Zinke stepped down in December amid multiple scandals and ethics investigations. Bernhardt was confirmed as deputy secretary of the interior in 2017, where he helped roll back regulations overseen by the department.</span><span style="" helvetica="Helvetica" neue="Neue" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb"><b>&nbsp;He worked to make the approval for land and offshore drilling projects easier, and proposed limiting protections for endangered species. Bernhardt also ordered some furloughed workers back to work during the government shutdown to push through on oil and natural gas drilling permits, offshore drilling and drilling in the Alaska refuge.</b></span></font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">&nbsp;</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">w no lnx</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Former Monsanto Executive Picked by Trump to Lead Wildlife Agency</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">President Donald Trump said he will nominate a former Monsanto executive to head the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), the Associated Press reported Tuesday.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Aurelia Skipwith, who Western Values Project Executive Director Chris Saeger called "a darling of corporate special interests," worked at the agribusiness giant for more than six years. She has since worked at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Department of the Interior (DOI).</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">A biologist and lawyer by training, Skipwith has been at the DOI since April 2017 overseeing policy and regulations at FWS and the National Park Service.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">She said she shared Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke's goals to "protect our species, increase public access and ensure science is at the forefront of our decisions" in a statement reported by the Associated Press.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">If she is confirmed by the Senate, she would be the first African American woman to run FWS.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">twit</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Aurelia Skipwith</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">DOI</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">During her time at Monsanto, Skipwith spent six years as a research team leader developing new agricultural products and then did a stint in corporate affairs, The Guardian reported. Monsanto polled as one of the 20 most hated companies in American in 2018, though its infamous name will soon die as part of a merger with Bayer this year.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>FWS has been without an official head since Trump took office. Greg Sheehan, who served as deputy director for 14 months before stepping down in August, could not serve as acting director because he lacked a science degree, the Associated Press reported.</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Under his lead, FWS has moved forward with policies that have worried environmentalists and animal lovers, including:</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><b>Weakening the Endangered Species Act:</b> A massive DOI proposal included a provision removing the "blanket rule" giving threatened species the same protections as endangered species.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Reversing the ban on imported elephant trophies: Last November, FWS undid an Obama-era ban on importing the remains of elephants killed legally in Zambia and Zimbabwe back into the U.S.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Allowing bee-killing pesticides in national wildlife refuges: In August, FWS lifted another Obama-era ban on the use of genetically modified crops and certain pesticides in national wildlife refuges. Some of the newly-allowed pesticides are made by Monsanto, The Guardian pointed out.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) told The Guardian it was unlikely that Skipwith would improve the situation, calling her "utterly unqualified" because she had no training in either wildlife management or fisheries.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"Aurelia Skipwith has been working in the Trump administration all along to end protections for billions of migratory birds, gut endangered species safeguards and eviscerate national monuments," CBD government affairs director Brett Hartl said.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">'Merger From Hell' Wins Approval From Trump DOJ ›</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">Monsanto's EPA-Manipulating Tactics Revealed in $289 Million 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Roman"></font></font></font></p></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/10/02/climate-science-deniers-trump-admin-happer-wehrum-rollins-wynn-simmons">https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/10/02/climate-science-deniers-trump-admin-happer-wehrum-rollins-wynn-simmons</a></font></font></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">readfearn</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>here are five folks spearheading the United States government who think that when it comes to climate change, they know better than all of the world’s main scientific&nbsp;institutions.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">There’s&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/donald-trump" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Donald Trump</a>&nbsp;himself, of course, who famously tweeted that climate change was a hoax invented by the Chinese, and said that&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/01/28/donald-trump-piers-morgan-interview-climate-denial-rebekah-robert-mercer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">a cold snap in the weather</a>&nbsp;overturns a century or more of scientific&nbsp;inquiry.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Then there’s energy secretary&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/rick-perry" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Rick Perry</a>, whose fuzzy logic on the science sees him unconvinced that&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>&nbsp;is the key driver of climate&nbsp;change.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/ryan-zinke" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Ryan Zinke</a>, Secretary of the Interior, is similarly confused and non-committal about the impacts of burning fossil fuels, as is former coal-lobbyist-turned-<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>&nbsp;head&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/andrew-wheeler" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Andrew Wheeler</a>.&nbsp;Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/ben-carson-believe-candidate-stands-10-issues" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">said in 2015 that climate change was “irrelevant,”</a>&nbsp;that temperatures were driven by natural cycles&nbsp;and, since then, has<a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/it-doesnt-matter-if-cities-are-climate-change-proof-if-no-one-can-afford-to-live-in-them/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">&nbsp;avoided questions about the role of human activity in climate change</a>.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span class="caps" style="">OK</span>, so there are more than five&nbsp;(with&nbsp;<a href="https://www.factcheck.org/2016/11/pences-stance-on-climate-change/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Mike Pence</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2018/03/07/trump-climate-change-deniers-443533" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Mike Pompeo, and Jeff Sessions</a>&nbsp;among those who have denied the science in the past), but these five&nbsp;are well positioned to influence the energy and climate policies of the&nbsp;nation.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Wheeler, </span>for example, is driving through cuts to national efficiency standards for motor vehicles and is relaxing pollution rules on coal power plants. Zinke and Perry are aggresively promoting fossil fuel growth with Trump as the climate-wrecker-in-chief. Carson heads an agency that has a role in promoting (or not)&nbsp;<a href="https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/HUD2014CCADAPTPLAN.PDF" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">climate change adaptation and resilience</a>&nbsp;for homes and properties, particularly after&nbsp;natural&nbsp;disasters.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Remembering not only do these five reject the advice of the world’s major science academies, but also the expertise of the scientists working in their own government&nbsp;agencies.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But while these five&nbsp;might be relative household names&nbsp;with their views well reported, DeSmog presents five lesser-known climate science deniers inside the administration who are also in positions to gut federal action on climate and promote&nbsp;fossil fuel-friendly policies, backed by their own convictions that climate change just isn't much of a&nbsp;problem.</font></font></font></p><h3 style="line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Will&nbsp;Happer</font></font></font></h3><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/william-happer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Will Happer</a>, emeritus professor from&nbsp;Princeton University,&nbsp;was once in the running as Trump’s science advisor but has now been appointed to the National Security Council, specializing in emerging&nbsp;technologies.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">After news of Happer’s appointment became public,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/09/trump-adds-physicist-will-happer-climate-science-opponent-white-house-staff" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Science</a>, republishing&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">E&E</span>&nbsp;News, characterized the 79-year-old physicist as a “vocal critic of mainstream climate&nbsp;science.”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But Happer is more than a mere critic — he has acted as an enabler and activist against action on climate change for well over a&nbsp;decade.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For years, Happer was chairman at the George Marshall Institute and then, when that was shuttered, he founded the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/co2-coalition" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>Coalition</a>&nbsp;with former Exxon director, the late&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/roger-cohen" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Roger Cohen</a>. Both groups took fringe positions on the science of climate change, with Happer claiming that adding more fossil fuel emissions into the atmosphere will be good for&nbsp;humans.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In 2015,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/08/greenpeace-exposes-sceptics-cast-doubt-climate-science" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Happer was caught in a sting by Greenpeace</a>&nbsp;when he offered to write a report on the “benefits” of&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>&nbsp;for a fake oil client and then hide the funding, which would be directed to the&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>&nbsp;Coalition. Since then, that group has received funding from the foundation of Trump backer and hedge fund billionaire&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/robert-mercer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Robert Mercer</a>.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In December 2016,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/planet-oz/2017/feb/21/trumps-potential-science-adviser-william-happer-hanging-around-with-conspiracy-theorists" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Happer attended a conference</a>&nbsp;organized by conspiracy theorist G. Edward Griffin.&nbsp;Now he’s on the National Security&nbsp;Council.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Late in 2017, the Trump administration&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/dec/18/trump-drop-climate-change-national-security-strategy" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">nixed climate change from a list of global threats</a>&nbsp;to the&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">U.S.</span>&nbsp;in the National Security&nbsp;Strategy.&nbsp;</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It's safe to say&nbsp;Happer won't be leading any pushes&nbsp;to add it back&nbsp;in.</font></font></font></p><h3 style="line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Bill&nbsp;Wehrum</font></font></font></h3><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/william-wehrum" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Bill Wehrum</a>&nbsp;is the&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">U.S.</span>&nbsp;government’s most senior official on air pollution, as the assistant administrator in the Office of Air and Radiation at the Environmental Protection Agency (<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>).</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wehrum is a long-serving lawyer for the coal industry, as well as petrochemical and petroleum industry groups (such as&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/koch-industries-inc" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Koch Industries</a>).</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wehrum’s office is also tasked with looking at regulations to tackle power plant pollution and climate change and recently proposed the Affordable Clean Energy rule as a replacement for Obama's Clean Power&nbsp;Plan.&nbsp;</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But as the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/19/us/politics/epa-coal-emissions-standards-william-wehrum.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">New York Times&nbsp;reported</a>,&nbsp;Wehrum has been&nbsp;delivering big time for his former fossil fuel industry clients by proposing the new rule, which&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>'s own analysis shows would increase premature deaths from&nbsp;pollution.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">One former&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>&nbsp;director, Bruce Buckheit, told the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/19/us/politics/epa-coal-emissions-standards-william-wehrum.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">New York Times</a>: “They basically found the most aggressive and knowledgeable fox and said, ‘Here are the keys to the&nbsp;hen-house.'”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Over a decade earlier, Wehrum was in the same position at&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>&nbsp;as he is now and back then argued against granting California a Clean Air Act waiver to set more stringent pollution standards for&nbsp;vehicles.&nbsp;</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Back in power at the&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">EPA</span>,&nbsp;he&nbsp;ran the agency's&nbsp;midterm review of auto emissions standards, which this year&nbsp;<a href="https://www.epa.gov/regulations-emissions-vehicles-and-engines/midterm-evaluation-light-duty-vehicle-greenhouse-gas" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">recommended rolling back</a>&nbsp;the stricter standards proposed by the Obama&nbsp;administration.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Under question&nbsp;during his confirmation hearings, Wehrum claimed that&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>&nbsp;emissions as a main driver of climate change, which the government’s own scientists confirm, was to him an “open&nbsp;question." [vid]</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Brooke&nbsp;Rollins</b></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Rollins was an aide to Texas Governor Rick Perry before spending 15 years leading the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/texas-public-policy-foundation" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Texas Public Policy Foundation</a>&nbsp;(<span class="caps" style="">TPPF</span>), which she left in early 2018 to become assistant to the president in the Office of American Innovation (<span class="caps" style="">OIA</span>), based in the White House (<a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tariniparti/jared-kushners-pet-project-is-missing-a-signature#.ck7gJ1kXQ" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">some wonder what the&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">OIA</span>&nbsp;actually does</a>).</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">During her time at&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">TPPF</span>, Rollins promoted the work of the organization’s&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/kathleen-hartnett-white" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Kathleen Hartnett White</a>, a climate science denier and fossil fuel evangelist whose controversial nomination to lead the White House Council on Environmental Quality was ultimately&nbsp;withdrawn.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In August 2018, Rollins appeared at the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-institute" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Heartland Institute</a>’s energy conference alongside that think tank’s new president&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/tim-huelskamp" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Tim&nbsp;Huelskamp.</a></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">At the conference, Rollins nodded as Huelskamp suggested American schoolchildren’s heads were being “filled with mush” about the dangers of&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">When asked if the inner-workings of the White House were as chaotic as some media had claimed, Rollins replied: “Is there chaos?&nbsp;Yes. But I would say it’s like the chaos of my home — having four children in five&nbsp;years.”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Home life was like a “goat rodeo,” she said, and working in the White House wasn’t “much&nbsp;different.”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">While at&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">TPPF</span>, Rollins wrote that&nbsp;<a href="https://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/energy-environment/335908-trump-should-kill-the-failing-paris-agreement" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Trump should exit the Paris climate agreement</a>.&nbsp;</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">What she's actually doing in her role with&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">OIA</span>&nbsp;remains unclear, but the fact that she appeared at the America First Energy Conference, hosted by a climate science denying think tank, indicates she isn't likely straying from her previous positions on climate and&nbsp;energy.</font></font></font></p><h3 style="line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Todd&nbsp;Wynn</font></font></font></h3><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/todd-wynn" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Todd Wynn</a>&nbsp;is director of the Interior Department’s Office of Intergovernmental and External Affairs after spending years in pro-fossil fuel industry think tanks, many with Koch&nbsp;network&nbsp;connections.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">On Wynn’s&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CV</span>&nbsp;is his time working at the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/american-legislative-exchange-council" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">American Legislative Exchange Council</a>&nbsp;(<span class="caps" style="">ALEC</span>), the corporate bill mill where he led that group’s energy task&nbsp;force.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In that position, he fought against state&nbsp;renewable energy mandates and federal regulation of fracking&nbsp;fluids.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Lisa Graves, co-director of DocumentedInvestigations.org, has described Wynn as an “aggressive fossil fuel&nbsp;insider.”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In his new position with the Department of the Interior, Wynn&nbsp;is responsible for “strengthen[ing]&nbsp;relationships between state and local partners and external stakeholders” with&nbsp;Secretary Zinke's office, which, by the looks of it, has already been quite&nbsp;<a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/lobbyist-regulations-interior-department_us_5ad10ac8e4b0edca2cb9b45f" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">cozy with fossil fuel stakeholders</a>.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">An investigation by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/todd-wynn-interior-ethics_us_5b23f523e4b0f9178a9cd1fc" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">HuffPost</a>&nbsp;alleged Wynn may have violated an ethics pledge by continuing to liaise with former associates while in his new&nbsp;job.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>Wynn has been a rising star in the influential network of fossil fuel-funded think tanks that push policies and produce pseudoscientific research to muddle the debate on climate change,” the HuffPost report&nbsp;detailed.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wynn has himself questioned the role that fossil fuel emissions have on warming the planet, suggesting in 2010 that it was “absolutely ridiculous” to claim&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">CO2</span>&nbsp;was driving climate&nbsp;change.</font></font></font></p><h3 style="line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Daniel&nbsp;Simmons</font></font></font></h3><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Who better to lead the Trump administration's&nbsp;Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy than a man who once asked for that same office to be closed while barracking for fossil fuels?&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/daniel-simmons" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Daniel Simmons</a>&nbsp;is just that&nbsp;guy.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/05/06/trump-taps-renewable-energy-antagonist-run-renewable-energy-office" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">reported by DeSmog</a>&nbsp;and others, Simmons spent years working for&nbsp;so-called “free market think tanks,”&nbsp;including the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/institute-energy-research" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Institute for Energy Research</a>, before joining the Trump transition team and then securing the nomination for the role, located in the Department of&nbsp;Energy.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Simmons has a history of working at organizations that attack&nbsp;programs aimed at&nbsp;encouraging&nbsp;the development of clean energy industries like solar and wind power.&nbsp;But in 2015, the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/american-energy-alliance-aea" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">American Energy Alliance</a>&nbsp;(<span class="caps" style="">AEA</span>), where he was working, attacked the office Simmons now heads, writing disapprovingly that its role was to “promote and subsidize 'clean energy'&nbsp;as determined by government&nbsp;bureaucrats.”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The office,&nbsp;<span class="caps" style="">AEA</span>&nbsp;wrote,&nbsp;“aims to control multiple sectors of the economy, from energy production and transmission to manufacturing and construction.”&nbsp;Cutting the office&nbsp;entirely could “save” the administration more than $9 billion.&nbsp;Simmons himself has claimed that the costs of the Paris climate agreement target of keeping global temperatures below 2 degrees Celsius&nbsp;would be greater than any&nbsp;benefits.</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Perfect man for the job?&nbsp;In the Trump administration, the answer is&nbsp;yes.</font></font></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></p></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/5-horrifying-things-about-scott-pruitts-epa-replacement">https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/5-horrifying-things-about-scott-pruitts-epa-replacement</a></font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://qz.com/1322131/andrew-wheeler-coal-lobbyist-replaces-scott-pruitt-as-head-of-epa/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://qz.com/1322131/andrew-wheeler-coal-lobbyist-replaces-scott-pruitt-as-head-of-epa/</font></a></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Wheeler Will Be Better at Destroying the Environment</font></strong></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wheeler is described by the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/05/climate/wheeler-epa-pruitt.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><em>New York Times</em></a>&nbsp;as a “consummate Washington insider who avoids the limelight and has spent years effectively navigating the rules.”</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The acting chief is known for being highly effective in his work and avoiding the sorts of personal scandals that consumed Pruitt.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Analysts believe Wheeler could be more effective than Pruitt at implementing Trump’s deregulatory agenda at the EPA.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wheeler Was an Energy Industry Lobbyist</font></strong></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Like Pruitt, this veteran coal lobby lobbyist has shown only disdain for the E.P.A.’s vital mission to protect Americans’ health and our environment,” Ana Unruh Cohen, managing director for government affairs at the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the Times.Following his tenure at the EPA in the administration of George W. Bush, he became a&nbsp;<a href="https://fortune.com/2018/07/05/who-is-andrew-wheeler-epa-trump-replace-scott-pruitt/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">lobbyist</a>&nbsp;for Murray Energy. The head of the company is a supporter of Trump’s.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Wheeler Worked for a Climate Change Denier</font></strong></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The acting EPA administrator previously worked for Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), a climate change denier who called the science “the greatest hoax” ever perpetrated on Americans.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Many remember Inhofe for his attempt to debunk global warming “hysteria” by bringing a snowball into the Senate.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">He&nbsp;<a href="https://qz.com/1322131/andrew-wheeler-coal-lobbyist-replaces-scott-pruitt-as-head-of-epa/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">served</a>&nbsp;as the vice president of the Washington Coal Club.<strong>Wheeler Really Loves Coal</strong></font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This organization is a quiet federation of more than 300 coal producers, corporate leaders, policy professionals and lawmakers.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Founded in 1981, the WCC is a powerful force for the coal industry today.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Wheeler Lobbied to Open Public Land to Uranium Mining</font></strong></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“[We] respectfully request that DOI reduce the size of the BENM to only those specific areas or sites, if any, deemed to need additional protection beyond what is already available to Federal land management agencies,” Energy Fuels Resources wrote to the Trump administration in a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/uranium-firm-urged-trump-officials-to-shrink-bears-ears-national-monument/2017/12/08/2eea39b6-dc31-11e7-b1a8-62589434a581_story.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;">request</a>&nbsp;to open parts of Bear Ears National Monument to uranium mining.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>FaegreBD&nbsp;</b>was the lobbying firm that helped the organization petition the administration.</font></font></font></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The two lobbyists who worked the Energy Fuels Resources case? Mary Bono,</b>&nbsp;and now-acting EPA chief Andrew Wheeler.</font></font></font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div></div><div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/superfund-task-force-led-lawyer-spills" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/superfund-task-force-led-lawyer-spills</font></a></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style=""><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">AP) — A lawyer tapped to lead a task force at the Environmental Protection Agency overseeing cleanups at the nation’s most polluted places worked until recently for a top chemical and plastics manufacturer with a troubled legacy of creating some of those toxic sites.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Steven D. Cook has been named as the new chair of the Superfund Task Force, which EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt created last year to revamp how the agency oversees cleanups at the more than 1,300 toxic sites.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Before beginning work in February as deputy assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management, Cook served more than 20 years as in-house corporate counsel for LyondellBasell Industries — one of the world’s largest plastics, chemicals and refining companies.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA records show that LyondellBasell and its subsidiaries are listed as being potentially responsible for at least three dozen Superfund polluted sites.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">An analysis by The Associated Press shows that&nbsp;<b>nearly half the political appointees hired at EPA under President Donald Trump have industry ties. Of more than 60 EPA hires tracked by the AP over the last year, about one-third worked as registered lobbyists or lawyers for chemical manufacturers, fossil fuel producers or other EPA-regulated companies.</b></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Trump promised as a presidential candidate to drain the swamp in Washington. An executive order signed two weeks after his inauguration bars former lobbyists and corporate lawyers from participating in any matter they worked on for private clients within two years of going to work for the government.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Following a request by AP, EPA provided a copy of an April 20 memo Cook signed recusing himself from participating in regulatory matters involving LyondellBasell. However, as stated in the letter, Cook can participate in matters affecting his former employer as long as his actions would also impact at least five similarly situated companies.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“All EPA employees receive ethics briefings when they start and continually work with our ethics office regarding any potential conflicts they may encounter while employed here,” said Lincoln Ferguson, an EPA spokesman. “Steven Cook is no different.”</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It was not immediately clear whether Cook would be allowed to participate in decisions involving LyondellBasell, anyway.&nbsp;</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">AP reported in March that White House counsel&nbsp;<b>Don McGahn has issued at least 37 ethics waivers to key administration officials, including three working at EPA,</b>&nbsp;that allow them to help regulate the very industries from which they previously collected paychecks even after signing recusals. It was not clear whether Cook was granted a waiver, and Ferguson did not respond to AP’s inquiries on the subject.</span></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Lyondell Chemical Co., a Houston-based subsidiary of LyondellBasell, agreed to pay $250 million in 2010 to settle environmental claims and provide cleanup funds for 15 properties across the country as part of bankruptcy proceedings.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Another subsidiary of the Dutch chemicals conglomerate, Equistar Chemicals, agreed in 2007 to spend more than $125 million on pollution controls and cleanup costs to address a myriad of air, water and hazardous waste violations at seven petrochemical plants in Texas, Illinois, Iowa and Louisiana. Court filings made as part of the company’s legal settlement with the Justice Department, and EPA listed Cook as the primary contact for Equistar.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">LyondellBasell subsidiaries are identified as a responsible party on dozens of Superfund sites. The companies set aside funds for cleanups before emerging from bankruptcy.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“LyondellBasell resolved its Superfund obligations nearly a decade ago,” said Pattie Shieh-Lance, a corporate spokeswoman in Houston. “The company does not currently have any such obligations.”</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Cook is taking over as chair of the Superfund Task Force following the resignation of Albert “Kell” Kelly, a longtime friend and business associate of Pruitt’s. AP reported in August that federal banking regulators had banned Kelly, who previously the chairman of Oklahoma-based SpiritBank, from banking for life. Members of Congress had been pressing for details about what led to the banking sanctions against Kelly when he quit his EPA job.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Cook’s appointment to lead the task force was first reported by Bloomberg.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">He is currently the top political appointee at EPA’s Land and Emergency Management office, which oversees the agency’s response to chemical spills and oversees management of the Superfund program.</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Trump has nominated Peter C. Wright to serve as assistant administrator for Land and Emergency Management, but he has not yet been confirmed to the post by the U.S. Senate. Wright has worked as a corporate lawyer at Dow Chemical Co. since 1999.</font></font></font></div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></div></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></font></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">omg change how rules are made</font></font></font></p><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-nancy-beck-chemical-safety-2389388927.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">https://www.ecowatch.com/epa-nancy-beck-chemical-safety-2389388927.html</a></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">&nbsp;&nbsp;By Melanie Benesh</font></font></font></div><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The&nbsp;<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;">Trump administration</a>&nbsp;just appointed a&nbsp;<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/04/trump-just-put-chemical-industy-hack-charge-assessing-chemicals-epa" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;">chemical industry bigwig</a>&nbsp;to a high-level chemical safety position at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;">EPA</a>) as deputy assistant administrator of the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>You read that right. Nancy Beck is coming to the EPA straight from the American Chemistry Council (ACC), the powerful lobby whose members include Dow Chemical, DuPont,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/monsanto" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;">Monsanto</a>, ExxonMobil Chemical, Chevron Phillips Chemical and Bayer.&nbsp;</b>Now she'll be making decisions as the deputy assistant administrator of the EPA department whose stated&nbsp;<a href="https://www.epa.gov/aboutepa/about-office-chemical-safety-and-pollution-prevention-ocspp" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">mission</a>&nbsp;is to "protect you, your family, and the environment from potential risks from pesticides and toxic chemicals."</font></font></font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Here's three things to know about Nancy Beck:</font></font></font></p><p /><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">1. She has helped craft the chemical industry's political agenda for years....</font></strong></font></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">doe simmons and crissy harbin</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.kochvsclean.com/trump-picks-renewable-energy-hater-run-renewable-energy-office/">http://www.kochvsclean.com/trump-picks-renewable-energy-hater-run-renewable-energy-office/</a></font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">koch swamp things, staffers</font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /></font></font><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Trump administration has recruited officials to fill its top energy and environmental staff positions from fossil fuel lobbying groups, Koch brothers-funded think tanks, and climate-denying lawmakers’ offices, according to a new database from the Center for American Progress Action Fund.</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div>Launched Monday, the project tracks political appointments to energy and environment positions and their past affiliations. Of the more than 100 political staff working on energy and environmental issues, close to one-third have ties to the fossil fuel industry and petrochemical billionaires Charles and David Koch, according to the tracker.</div><div>
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</div><div>Their industry ties often put them at odds with the stated missions of their agencies, especially for appointees working to address air and water pollution and protect federal lands, raising questions about the policy goals of their bosses?—?Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt.</div><div>
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</div><div>Influx of anti-regulation political appointees turns EPA’s mission on its head</div><div>
</div><div>Trump’s EPA viewed as most anti-environment in a generation.</div><div>
</div><div>“These staffers are tasked with making decisions about the air we breathe and water we drink, yet many of them have worked for industries and organizations that have been fighting for years to undo environmental protections and prolong the life of dirty energy,” Erin Auel, research associate for the Center for American Progress Action Fund, said in a statement. ThinkProgress is an editorially independent news site housed within the Center for American Progress Action Fund.</div><div>
</div><div>The website, DirtyDeputies.org, will maintain a running list of political appointees for energy and environment and their previous employers. It will allow users to sort the political appointees by their special interest affiliations. The public is invited to submit tips on any of the appointees or new staff who have been hired.</div><div>
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</div><div>“It’s not surprising that the Trump administration is the next stop on the career paths of old hands in the big oil, Koch, and climate denial networks,” Kevin Connor, director of the Public Accountability Initiative, a nonprofit group that researches business and government corruption, said in an email to ThinkProgress. “This kind of capture of the federal regulatory apparatus is something they’ve been preparing for, and something that will have real consequences for public health and the environment, as we’ve seen play out on the state level.”</div><div>
</div><div>“This kind of capture of the federal regulatory apparatus… will have real consequences.”</div><div>
</div><div>Given the backgrounds of the officials filling these high-level positions, “we should be prepared for them to be particularly extreme in their abdication of responsibility to the public, in favor of their masters in polluting industries,” Connor warned.</div><div>
</div><div>David Bernhardt, one of political appointees listed in the Dirty Deputies tracker, is awaiting confirmation by the full Senate to become the second-highest ranking official at the Department of the Interior. Bernhardt, who runs the natural resources department at lobbying and law firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, has spent the last several years working on behalf of oil and gas companies and large agribusiness to weaken environmental protections.</div><div>
</div><div>“A vote for Bernhardt is a vote for the Koch brothers and big industry and a vote against public lands, people and health,” Randi Spivak, public lands program director for the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement.</div><div>
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</div><div>Doug Matheney now works as a top assistant to Perry after previously serving as the state coordinator for the Count on Coal initiative. He also worked as a coordinator for the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity.</div><div>
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</div><div>The database also lists Mandy Gunasekara, who joined Pruitt’s staff at the EPA in March as a top adviser. Gunasekara worked as the National Association of Chemical Distributors’ senior director of legislative affairs where she lobbied for reforming the Toxic Substances Control Act. She also previously worked as a staffer for Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), a position in which she handed a snowball to Inhofe on the Senate floor. The Republican senator argued the existence of the snowball in winter disproved global warming.</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Matt Kasper, research director at the Energy & Policy Institute, emphasized that the Trump administration’s appointed staffers now represent the mainstream of Republican ideology. “The Republican Party has adopted positions that deny the science behind climate change, wants to gut the EPA in order to prevent it from carrying out its mission, and prevent further air and water safeguards,” Kasper told ThinkProgress.</span></div><div>
</div><div>According to the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the tracker will help increase transparency of the political appointees who are “pulling the strings on Trump’s dirty energy agenda.”</div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">cop21, 23</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><a href="https://www.corporateaccountability.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Executive-Summary_EN_webversionFINAL.pdf"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.corporateaccountability.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Executive-Summary_EN_webversionFINAL.pdf</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Industry groups stalk the halls of the UNFCCC</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>
</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In this section, Corporate Accountability discusses</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">one of the most egregious ways big polluting</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">industries undermine climate policy: by walking the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">halls as “observers” to the UNFCCC negotiations.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Currently, groups like the&nbsp;<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">U.S. Chamber of</span></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Commerce, Business Europe, and the Business</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Council of Australia,&nbsp;</span>which have all undermined</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">climate action on behalf of their corporate</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">members, have unfettered access to the climate</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">talks. Such access allows for not only direct</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">lobbying of delegates, but also for unparalleled</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">information gathering, as well as the greenwashing</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">of corporate images. To address the myriad ways</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">the presence of trade associations undermines</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">the talks and to strengthen the implementation of</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">the Paris Agreement, the authors resolve for the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">UNFCCC to adopt a standard definition of conflict</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">of interest and implement a binding conflict of</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">interest policy to help reveal and limit undue</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">corporate influence via observer participation.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Carbon majors masquerading as part of the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">tech solution</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Environmentally sound technologies, such as</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">renewable energy and local innovations, will play</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">an essential role in mitigating and adapting to</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">climate change.&nbsp;<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">While there is a mechanism in</span></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">the UNFCCC to accelerate development, transfer,</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">and deployment of climate technologies to Global</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">South countries, this mechanism has been coopted</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">by Big Polluters, from Électricité de France</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">and&nbsp;<b>Shell</b>&nbsp;to the World Coal Association</span>. As Neth</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Daño of the ETC Group explains, this cooptation</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">prevents the Technology Mechanism from</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">providing sound information and technical advice.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Instead it allows polluting corporations to project</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">an image of being part of the solution while at the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">same time continuing to operate businesses that</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">are primarily responsible for the climate crisis. The</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">UNFCCC should not allow industry involvement</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">to compromise this transfer. Instead, as Daño</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">recommends, the Secretariat should fully evaluate</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">the environmental, social, and economic impacts</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">of climate technologies and ensure that the nonState</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">actors invited to take part in technology</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">development, transfer, and deployment do not</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">introduce potential conflicts of interest.</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Article 6 and the invisible hand of carbon chaos</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>
</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Markets are often portrayed as a magical solution</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">to environmental pollution. Yet study after study</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">reveals that carbon markets not only fail to reduce</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">emissions but create new problems as well.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Article 6, which may provide incentives to set</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">up and expand carbon markets, could very well</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">make matters worse—providing opportunities for</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Big Polluters to continue to pollute egregiously</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">without consequence and distracting attention</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">from real solutions. Not surprisingly, trade groups</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">and corporations have promoted these markets</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">and affiliated individuals have even found a place</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">at the negotiating table. This is unacceptable.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In this section, Corporate Accountability calls for</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">governments to create binding regulations that</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">require polluting corporations to drastically reduce</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">emissions and reject carbon markets.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The corrupting influence of corporations’</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">COP sponsorships</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For almost as long as the UNFCCC has existed, the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">very same transnational corporations whose profits</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">depend on the burning of oil, coal, and gas have</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">been permitted to bankroll the U.N. climate talks.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In this section, Corporate Europe Observatory’s</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Pascoe Sabido makes the case for eliminating the</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">corporate sponsorship of international climate</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">negotiations. As Sabido outlines, transnational</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">corporations use the access to the UNFCCC that</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">sponsorship buys them to undermine progress</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">and push false solutions (like failed carbon</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">trading or carbon capture and storage schemes).</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">While addressing sponsorship alone will not fully</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">eliminate corporate influence at the COPs, it</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">would chip away at the green and blue façades</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Big Polluters have erected. It would also provide</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">space for an honest conversation on what role</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Big Polluters should have in solving a crisis that</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">they continue to profit from. Sabido concludes</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">with a call for a policy to reject sponsorship from</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">corporations whose interests are in conflict with</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">the objectives of the UNFCCC and for COPs to</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">instead be financed equitably by member states.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>
</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Fighting corporate interests in the</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Green Climate Fund</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As Lidy Nacpil of the Asian Peoples’ Movement on</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Debt and Development discusses in this section...</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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<div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">EPA</font></div>

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<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">OMG</font>

<a href="https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/21/headlines/report_trump_to_name_coal_industry_lobbyist_as_epa_2nd_in_command" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/21/headlines/report_trump_to_name_coal_industry_lobbyist_as_epa_2nd_in_command</font></a>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">President Trump is set to name coal industry lobbyist Jeff Holmstead as second-in-command at the Environmental Protection Agency, according to the news site Axios. Since 2007, Holmstead has represented coal, railroad and utility companies as a partner at the powerful firm Bracewell LLP on K Street in Washington, D.C. Holmstead is also a former staffer to Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, a prominent climate change denier.</font>

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<div><a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060050546/"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" color="#000000">https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060050546/</font></a></div>

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<p style=" background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; margin: 1em 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The presidential transition team for U.S. EPA included members whose identities have not been officially disclosed, including one who said yesterday that candidate Donald Trump's call for abolishing the agency "struck a chord with me."</b></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The transition did not&nbsp;<a href="https://greatagain.gov/agency-landing-teams-54916f71f462#.55i0sjmrg" style=" background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-weight: bold;">list</a>&nbsp;the unknown aides among nine "landing team" members who conducted interviews with EPA employees.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">They were part of the broader "action team" responsible for producing an "action plan" for the agency, Myron Ebell, who headed the transition effort, said in an email exchange yesterday with E&E News.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Ebell declined to name those extra members, saying he considers their identities confidential unless they choose to disclose their involvement.</b></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>

</b><span style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>"So I had been working on plans for fixing EPA, and it's a dream come true after fighting EPA for 25 years,</b>" Milloy said. "I think you're starting to see the fruits of that."At least one participant has been happy to reveal himself. Steve Milloy, an attorney and longtime legal foe of EPA, highlights his role on his Twitter&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/JunkScience" style=" background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-weight: bold;">biography</a>&nbsp;and noted it again yesterday during a panel discussion at the Conservative Political Action Conference.</span></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Milloy, a fierce critic of mainstream climate science who runs the website JunkScience.com, has been involved in repeated legal challenges against EPA.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">A 2012 lawsuit, for example, likened tests exposing people to diesel engine particulate emissions to medical experiments performed in Nazi concentration camps.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Another from last year sought to disband an EPA particulate matter review panel on grounds that most of its members had received grant funding and were thus biased in favor of the agency's position on stricter regulation. Both suits were unsuccessful.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In an interview late yesterday, Milloy also declined to list the other undisclosed members of the transition team or say how many there were.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Legally, only those who go into EPA offices have to be identified, he said, and that's primarily to let the agency know who they are.</b></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Trump has consistently made EPA a target, at one point last year suggesting the agency could be eliminated. That "struck a chord with me," Milloy said at yesterday's CPAC event.</font></p>

<h3 style=" background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; margin: 1em 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">'Concerning'</font></h3>

<p style=" background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; margin: 1em 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Trump transition team's approach differed from that taken by the incoming Obama administration eight years ago, said Bob Sussman, who co-chaired the EPA team at the time and went on to serve as the agency's senior policy counsel.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Obama team revealed all of the approximately 15 EPA transition members, in part to let the public gauge whether there were any conflicts of interest, Sussman said in a phone interview today. There was no distinction between the "landing team" and a broader "action team," he said.</font>

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The Obama transition team produced a report of findings and recommendations for the incoming EPA leadership that was not made public on the grounds that it was an internal deliberative document, Sussman said."It's concerning," Sussman said, if other undisclosed participants were involved in the Trump transition effort. He added, "We should know who they are."</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Similarly, the final version of the Trump team's action plan has not been released, although the media company Axios last month reported elements of what may have been an earlier draft (<em style=" background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060048813/" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; font-weight: bold;">Greenwire</a></em>, Jan. 23).</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Among the recommendations: halting EPA's funding for scientific research and overhauling the agency's science advisory process to eliminate bias and conflicts of interest.</b></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Milloy yesterday told CPAC attendees that he hoped to see EPA "removed" from all scientific research.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"Ultimately, EPA needs to be removed from science," he said. "You can't be responsible for producing science and then regulating based on the science you invented. Those functions just have to be separated."</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">After the Axios story ran, an administration spokesman said Scott Pruitt, Trump's then-nominee to head the agency, knew nothing about the action plan.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=" background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Pruitt won Senate confirmation for the post last Friday; he is now "supposed to implement" the plan, Milloy said.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Doug Ericksen, an agency spokesman, did not reply to an email this morning requesting a copy of the document and asking whether Pruitt plans to implement it.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In a Tuesday speech to EPA employees, Pruitt appealed for civility</b>. John O'Grady, president of an American Federation of Government Employees council that represents thousands of agency workers, had not seen the plan but fully expected Pruitt to pursue it.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"He's a good soldier, and I think that it's inevitable," O'Grady said in an interview today.</font></p>

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<div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">DOE</font></div>

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<p style=" margin: 1.5em 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The future Donald Trump administration's energy agenda is revealed in a memo prepared by Trump's energy transition head Thomas Pyle, titled "What to Expect from the Trump Administration." The document, obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), was sent by Pyle on November 15th, just days before the Trump campaign announced Pyle's appointment as head of his Department of Energy transition team.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Pyle is the President of both the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/American_Energy_Alliance" target="blank" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">American Energy Alliance&nbsp;</a>and the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Institute_for_Energy_Research" target="blank" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">Institute for Energy Research</a>. Both organizations have received cash from numerous fossil fuel funders including ExxonMobil, Peabody Energy and Koch Industries. From 2001 to 2005, Pyle was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2016/11/28/koch-funded-former-lobbyist-replaces-koch-lobbyist-trump-s-energy-transition-team" target="_blank" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">Director of Federal Affairs for Koch Industries</a>.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The memo outlines fourteen policies to be expected from President-elect Trump, which collectively amounts to a fossil fuel industry wish list and which would be devastating for attempts to slow climate change.</font></p>

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<p style=" margin: 1.5em 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The agenda includes withdrawing from the 2015 Paris Climate agreement, eliminating the Clean Power Plan, increasing the leasing of federal lands for exploitation of coal, oil and gas, expediting the approval of pipeline projects including the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipeline and rolling back federal fuel economy standards.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3232186-Pyle-What-to-Expect-From-the-Trump-Administration.html" target="_blank" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">Read the memo here</a>.</font>

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