Over the strong objections of environmental groups, the Senate confirmed Scott Pruitt to lead the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday, giving President Donald Trump an eager partner to fulfill his campaign pledge to increase the use of planet-warming fossil fuels. In six years as Oklahoma’s attorney general, Pruitt filed 14 lawsuits challenging EPA regulations that included limits on carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants.
Category: Environmental Law
Trump administration will regulate Trump’s businesses, raising prospect of conflicts
President-elect Donald Trump stands with his children, Eric Trump, far left, Ivanka Trump, and Donald Trump Jr., far right, at a Jan. 11 press conference at Trump Tower in New York. A display of Trump-branded wine, champagne, water and steaks on March 8 at the Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Fla.
Federal judge rules on Crown Hill North Woods case
Jane Magnus-Stinson, Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, has denied the request from the Indiana Forest Alliance and plaintiffs to halt the U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs’ columbaria project at Crown Hill Cemetery’s North Woods.
In EPA rebuke, judge orders quick evaluation on coal jobs
A judge has ordered federal regulators to quickly evaluate how many power plant and coal mining jobs are lost because of air pollution regulations. McCarthy had responded to the judge’s previous order in a lawsuit brought against her by Murray Energy Corp. that the EPA must start doing an analysis that it hadn’t done in decades.
Pruitt an Unacceptable Choice, Ohio Scientists Tell Sen. Portman
Scientists, engineers and health professionals in Ohio have delivered a letter today to Sen. Rob Portman’s office expressing their strong opposition to President-elect Trump’s nominee to run the Environmental Protection Agency , Scott Pruitt. Portman, a Republican, will be a key vote on whether the closely-divided Senate puts Pruitt in charge of the EPA, an agency he has repeatedly tried to undermine as Oklahoma attorney general.
Former Volkswagen Exec Charged With Conspiracy To Defraud US
Oliver Schmidt, who used to serve as the top emissions compliance manager for Volkswagen AG in the U.S., was arrested by the FBI on Saturday, charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States over the company’s diesel emissions cheating scandal. The former executive will appear U.S. District Court in Miami on Monday afternoon.
It’s Alaska’s turn for EPA regional administrator, but will Trump listen to tradition?
Some Alaskans are eagerly anticipating the selection of a new regional administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency, hoping that this time, an Alaskan will oversee the regional office. There’s a tradition, but no requirement, of rotation among the states in the region.
Republican attorneys general eager to dism…
As soon as President-elect Donald Trump assumes office Jan. 20, Republican attorneys general who have spent the past eight years battling the Obama administration’s climate change agenda will have a new role: supporting the Republican president’s complex legal effort to roll back that agenda. By contrast, states with Democratic leadership – such as California, where Gov. Jerry Brown has promised all-out war against Mr. Trump on global warming – will go from being environmental partners with the federal government to legal aggressors on their own.
Trump’s choices shouldn’t be surprising
There has been much hand-wringing in some circles about many of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet selections, people who seem to disdain the very agencies he is asking them to direct. Yet Trump, sometimes criticized for not being a true Republican, is making Cabinet choices that line up well with the party’s rhetoric and stated ideology.
House Republicans shut down investigation into Flint water crisis, blame EPA instead
As President Obama signed a bill Friday authorizing $170 million to address lead in the drinking water in Flint , Michigan, Republicans in the House quietly closed a nearly yearlong investigation into the disaster before receiving crucial information from Republican Gov. Rick Snyder. Utah Republican Jason Chaffetz, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, sent a pair of letters late Friday afternoon offering no new information and essentially summarizing what was already revealed about the crisis during several high-profile hearings earlier this year to announce the end of his investigation.
Trump administration orders EPA contract and media blackout
The Trump administration has instituted a media blackout at the Environmental Protection Agency and barred staff from awarding any new contracts or grants, part of a broader communications clampdown within the executive branch. The prohibitions came to light Tuesday as the agency moved to delay implementation of at least 30 environmental rules finalized in the closing months of President Barack Obama’s term, a potential first step to seeking to kill the regulations.