Koch Industries and Fracking Lobbyist Mike Catanzaro To Lead Trump Energy Team

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The Washington Post has reported thatย Mike Catanzaro,ย a former senior energy staffer for Republican Party House Majority Leader John Boehner with a track record of climate change denial, will lead Republican Party presidential candidate Donald Trump’s energy transitionย team.ย 

Catanzaroย now works as a partner at the lobbying firm CGCN, where his clientsย include Noble Energy, Koch Industries, EnCana Oil and Gas, Halliburton,ย Devon Energy and others. For those clients, he lobbies on issues such asย pushing for more drilling on public lands on behalf of EnCana, against emissions regulations for drilling onshore and offshore wells on public lands for Hess Corporation and Devon, and for offshore drilling in Israel on behalf of Nobleย Energy.ย 

Noble Energy Executive Vice President Chip Rimer, also a member of the Board of Directors for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, recently attended a private meetingย between Colorado fracking industry executives and Trump in Denver,ย Colorado.

Beyond oil and gas issues,ย Catanzaro also lobbiesย against President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which calls for regulating carbon pollutionย from coal-fired power plants. In a May speech, the climate change-denyingย Trump said he intends to โ€œrescind all the job-destroying Obama executive actions including the Climate Action Planโ€ if electedย president.ย 

Catanzaroย is not the only Devon connection to the Trump campaign:ย Larry Nichols, Devon co-founder and Board of Directors Chairman Emeritus, also serves as aย Trump energy adviser.

The Post’s story landedย the same day DeSmog reported thatย Kathleen Hartnett-White, the climate change-denying former aide to First Lady Nancy Reagan and chairwoman of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) under Republican Governor Rick Perry, is under consideration to head the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) if Trump assumes the Whiteย House.

DeSmog has also reported that Trump’s prospective Secretary of Energy, hydraulic fracturing (โ€œfrackingโ€) baron Harold Hammย โ€” founder and CEO of Continental Resourcesย โ€” stands to gain economically from the building of TransCanada’s Keystone XL Pipeline and Energy Transfer Partners’ Dakota Access Pipeline.

Catanzaro:ย Oil-Soaked Road to Teamย Trump

Catanzaro’s current role in heading up Trump’s energy team is over a decade in the making, with a career track record soaked in oil andย gas.

After a brief stint as a writerย who studied at the industry-funded right-wing National Journalism Institute, Catanzaro launched his careerย as a communications director for the U.S. Congress’ climate change denier-in-chief, U.S. Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK). Inhofe made waves in February 2015 by bringing a snowballย onto the Senate floor as hisย evidence that climate change isย a โ€œhoax.โ€

After his time spent in Inhofe’s office, Catanzaro spent the second term of the George W. Bush Administration working on energy policy issues and then serving asย Associate Deputy Administrator of the EPA, while also working on Bush’s 2004 presidential campaign. He then passed through the government-industry revolving door, becoming a lobbyist and director of federal relations for coal utility company Pennsylvania Power & Light for a couple years until moving back into government and working for Inhofe again on theย Senate Environment and Public Works Committee asย Deputy Staffย Director.

After Inhofe,ย Catanzaro got a job working as senior energy policy adviser to Rep. Boehner, where he worked for a bit less than two years. During that time he also worked on 2012 Republican Party presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s campaign, heading up its EPA policy transitionย team.ย 

โ€œLaughย Testโ€

Perhaps looking for a pay raise,ย Catanzaro left the Committee after a couple years on the job and went back toย the lobbying world, securing a job at FTIย Consulting.

FTI runsย the fracking industry-funded front group Energy In Depth, which serves as an attack dog PR voice on behalf of the industry and helps to fend off criticismย by citizens, regulators,ย policymakers and theย media.

While employed by FTI, Catanzaro testified in Congress against the Clean Power Plan,ย co-authored a paper supporting the export ofย U.S. crude oil and advocated for weakening the Endangered Speciesย Act.ย 

Continuing the trend of never staying anywhere for too long, after a couple years at FTI,ย Catanzaroย has spent the past two years working for the lobbying firm CGCN Group and as a senior fellow for the industry-funded American Council on Capital Formation (ACCF), according to his LinkedInย profile.

In 2015,ย Catanzaro gave a presentation noting that if a Republican wins the White House, one of the first things he will do in office is overturn incorporating climate change into National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews of proposed federal energy infrastructure projects, somethingย called for recently by the Obama Administration.ย 

โ€œTrumpโ€™s anointment of Catanzaro to head his energy transition team, if elected, doesnโ€™t pass the laugh test. As someone who has spent his entire career shilling for the dirty energy industry, itโ€™s hard to imagine anyone more compromised,โ€ Wenonah Hauter, Executive Directorย of Food and Waterย Action Fund, told DeSmog. โ€œWhen future generations study how self-serving climate deniers gained public prominence, he will be one of the peopleย named.โ€

Photo Credit: U.S. National Archives at Collegeย Park

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Steve Horn is the owner of the consultancy Horn Communications & Research Services, which provides public relations, content writing, and investigative research work products to a wide range of nonprofit and for-profit clients across the world. He is an investigative reporter on the climate beat for over a decade and former Research Fellow for DeSmog.

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