Tag: Scott Pruitt

The Ten Worst Things Scott Pruitt’s EPA Has Already Done

The following commentary by was posted on the Daily Beast December 29, 2017:

Don’t be overwhelmed by bad environmental news—itemize it.

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY SARAH ROGERS/THE DAILY BEAS

No part of the government has been untouched by the Trump revolution. Multiple Cabinet departments are headed by people opposed to their core missions, the judiciary is being transformed at an unprecedented rate, and thanks to the new tax cut, even the sacred cows of Medicare and Social Security are now in line for legislative slaughter.

But nowhere is the takeover clearer than at the Environmental Protection Agency, now headed by Scott Pruitt, who made his name suing the watchdog on behalf of fossil-fuel interests. In one year, Pruitt has destroyed the foundations of the agency, firing scientists and replacing them with industry lobbyists; undoing critical regulations that protect our air and water; and favoring industry interests over public health. Continue reading “The Ten Worst Things Scott Pruitt’s EPA Has Already Done”

EPA’s Pruitt: Bring back ‘true environmentalism’

The following article by Timothy Cama was posted on the Hill website December 27, 2017:

© Getty

When it comes to environmentalism, Scott Pruitt thinks environmentalists have it all wrong.

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under President Trump has been on a quest to redefine the mission of the agency and, in the process, redefine what it means to be a guardian of the environment.

Pruitt, the former Republican attorney general of Oklahoma, has said in recent public appearances and interviews that environmentalism ought to mean using natural resources like fossil fuels and agricultural products to their fullest potential, while being mindful of their impact. Continue reading “EPA’s Pruitt: Bring back ‘true environmentalism’”

E.P.A. Delays Bans on Uses of Hazardous Chemicals

The following article by Sheila Kaplan was posted on the New York Times website December 19, 2017:

Senator Frank Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey, on Capitol Hill in 2012, a year before his death. He urged the stricter regulation of toxic chemicals.CreditChris Maddaloni/CQ Roll Call, via Getty Images

The Environmental Protection Agency will indefinitely postpone bans on certain uses of three toxic chemicals found in consumer products, according to an update of the Trump administration’s regulatory plans.

Critics said the reversal demonstrated the agency’s increasing reluctance to use enforcement powers granted to it last year by Congress under the Toxic Substances Control Act. Continue reading “E.P.A. Delays Bans on Uses of Hazardous Chemicals”

EPA to end controversial contract with conservative ‘media monitoring’ firm

The following article by Brady Dennis was posted on the Washington Post website December 19, 2017:

The firm hired by Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt to do “media monitoring” has ties to a group that helped promote his confirmation earlier this year. (Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images)

The Environmental Protection Agency is canceling a $120,000 “media tracking” contract it recently signed with a Republican public affairs and opposition-research firm amid questions about the firm’s political work and outrage from lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

The EPA had defended the contract with Definers Public Affairs, saying it hired the firm merely to act as a sophisticated news clipping service. An agency spokesman confirmed Tuesday that the EPA and the company had agreed to terminate the contract. In a separate conversation, the company’s president, Joe Pounder, said the decision was a mutual one. Continue reading “EPA to end controversial contract with conservative ‘media monitoring’ firm”

While you weren’t looking: 5 stories from the Trump administration that aren’t about taxes

The following article by A.P. Joyce was posted on the mic.com website December 18, 2017:

The news this week was dominated by the historic election of Doug Jonesin Alabama and the ongoing machinations to try to pass the Republican tax bill before the senator is sworn in.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has been hard at work making consequential policy decisions that affect the U.S. and its relationship with the rest of the world.

Here’s what you might have missed: Continue reading “While you weren’t looking: 5 stories from the Trump administration that aren’t about taxes”

E.P.A. Contractor Has Spent Past Year Scouring the Agency for Anti-Trump Officials

The following article by Eric Lipton and Lisa Friedman was posted on the New York Times website December 15, 2017:

Scott Pruitt, the administrator of the E.P.A., last week. Many information requests focus on employees known to be questioning management at the agency since Mr. Pruitt was confirmed. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times

One of the top executives of a consulting firm that the Environmental Protection Agency has recently hired to help it with media affairs has spent the past year investigating agency employees who have been critical of the Trump administration, federal records show.

The firm, Definers Public Affairs, based in Virginia, specializes in conducting opposition research, meaning that it seeks to find damaging information on political or corporate rivals.

A vice president for the firm, Allan Blutstein, federal records show, has submitted at least 40 Freedom of Information Act requests to the E.P.A. since President Trump was sworn in. Many of those requests target employees known to be questioning management at the E.P.A. since Scott Pruitt, the agency’s administrator, was confirmed. Continue reading “E.P.A. Contractor Has Spent Past Year Scouring the Agency for Anti-Trump Officials”

Under Trump, E.P.A. Has Slowed Actions Against Polluters, and Put Limits on Enforcement Officers

The following article by Eric Lipton and Danielle Ivory was posted on the New York Times website December 10, 2017:

The smokestacks from Heritage Thermal Services in East Liverpool, Ohio. Heritage incinerates hazardous waste at this facility. Credit Andrew Spear for The New York Times

EAST LIVERPOOL, Ohio — The highway billboard at the entrance to town still displays a giant campaign photograph of President Trump, who handily won the election across industrial Ohio. But a revolt is brewing here in East Liverpool over Mr. Trump’s move to slow down the federal government’s policing of air and water pollution.

The City Council moved unanimously last month to send a protest letter to the Environmental Protection Agency about a hazardous waste incineratornear downtown. Since Mr. Trump took office, the E.P.A. has not moved to punish the plant’s owner, even after extensive evidence was assembled during the Obama administration that the plant had repeatedly, and illegally, released harmful pollutants into the air.

“I don’t know where we go,” Councilman William Hogue, a retired social studies teacher, said in frustration to his fellow council members. “They haven’t resolved anything.” Continue reading “Under Trump, E.P.A. Has Slowed Actions Against Polluters, and Put Limits on Enforcement Officers”

The Environmental Scandal in Scott Pruitt’s Backyard

The following article by Malcolm Burnley was posted on the Politico website December 6, 2017:

It’s one of the dirtiest places in America. Former residents of Tar Creek, Oklahoma, want to know why Trump’s EPA chief didn’t prosecute allegations of wrongdoing during a federal buyout program.

PICHER, Okla. — Tar Creek, Oklahoma, is breathtaking in a terrible way: At one time the world’s deepest source of lead and zinc, the three-town region is now a cratered landscape so poisonous that no one, aside from 10 holdouts, can live there. Mountains of ashlike “chat,” a toxic residue from lead-zinc milling, rise majestically among the remains of homes torn from their foundations. Abandoned pets forage around the ruins. A child’s teddy bear lies sprawled in a ghostly living room. A gorilla statue fronts an empty high school, atop a sign proclaiming “1A Football State Champs, 1984.”

Tar Creek is also part of the environmental legacy of one of the state’s—and nation’s—leading politicians, Senator Jim Inhofe, and his longtime ally, Scott Pruitt, the former Oklahoma attorney general who is now head of President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency. After the EPA struggled to clean up the area, in 2006, Inhofe endorsed a plan in which a trust overseen by local citizens would use federal dollars to purchase homes and businesses in the toxic region so residents could move elsewhere. Then, when the plan proved so problematic that it spawned more than a half-dozen civil lawsuits and an audit into possible criminal wrongdoing, Pruitt, as the state’s attorney general, invoked an exception to state freedom-of-information laws to keep the audit from being an open public record. Continue reading “The Environmental Scandal in Scott Pruitt’s Backyard”

‘Mr. Pruitt is welcome to officially fire me’ – as EPA carries out controversial policy, one scientist balks

The following article by Brady Dennis and Juliet Eilperin was posted on the Washington Post website November 10, 2017:

Credit:  Melissa Phillips/Associated Press

When EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt announced a plan recently to forbid scientists who receive grants from the agency from serving as outside advisers, he singled out three key groups: the Scientific Advisory Board, the Clean Air Science Advisory Committee and the Board of Scientific Counselors.

While those rank among the most influential groups in providing the EPA with the scientific and technical advice it historically relies on while crafting environmental regulations, they represent only a portion of the agency’s outside advisers. The EPA boasts 22 advisory committees, offering regulators guidance on everything from children’s health to pesticides to hazardous waste. Continue reading “‘Mr. Pruitt is welcome to officially fire me’ – as EPA carries out controversial policy, one scientist balks”

‘Let us do our job’: Anger erupts over EPA’s apparent muzzling of scientists

The following article by Brady Dennis and Juliet Eilperin was posted on the Washington Post website October 23, 2017:

Protesters gather Monday outside a meeting where a report on the Narragansett Bay, which included a focus on climate change, was to be released in Providence, R.I. The Environmental Protection Agency prohibited three scientists from speaking at the event. (Michelle R. Smith/AP)

The Trump administration’s decision to prevent government scientists from presenting climate change-related research at a conference in Rhode Island on Monday gave the event a suddenly high profile, with protesters outside, media inside and angry lawmakers and academics criticizing the move.

“This type of political interference, or scientific censorship — whatever you want to call it — is ill-advised and does a real disservice to the American public and public health,” Sen. Jack Reed (D), Rhode Island’s senior senator, said at an opening news conference for the State of Narragansett Bay and Its Watershed event in Providence. “We can debate the issues. We can have different viewpoints. But we should all be able to objectively examine the data and look at the evidence.” Continue reading “‘Let us do our job’: Anger erupts over EPA’s apparent muzzling of scientists”