Heartland Institute 'Red Team' Climate Lists Revealed, And Science Deniers Are Upset With Pruitt

Brendan DeMelle DeSmog
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The Heartland Institute has been pushing a โ€œred teamโ€ agenda on climate for at least eight years,ย and claim theย roots of the idea started at a meeting in Milan in 2003 organized byย Fred Singerย and hisย Science and Environmental Policy Projectย (SEPP).ย And the infamous den of denial hasย enjoyed the Trump administration’s rhetoric attacking climateย science.ย 

But now they are complaining thatย Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administratorย Scott Pruittย isn’t committedย enough to the โ€œred teamโ€ concept. Heartland’s CEO and former president Joe Bast is particularly peeved, leaked emails recently revealed.

โ€œEPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s proposal for a Red Team-Blue Team exercise is vague, probably would not be effective, and is unlikely to come about,โ€ Bast wrote in an internal Heartland email first reported onย byย Niina Heikkinen and Robin Bravender ofย E&E Newsย earlier thisย week.

Leaked Bastย Email

Bast’s email includes highlights and notes from the second โ€œ’Red Team briefing’ย hosted by Heartland on this topic.โ€ According to Bast’s email, โ€œthe first took place on June 14 in Washington DC, and a third and perhaps final meeting is planned for Houston on November 8, the day before Heartlandโ€™s America First Energy Conference. The invitation list consists of around 150 climate experts I assembled and sent to folks at EPA in response to their request forย recommendations.โ€

Heartland’s strategyย is to โ€œget good people onto EPA advisory boards and into the administration.โ€ As part of its push to seed the โ€œRed Teamโ€ with its own experts, Heartland sent its own lists of โ€œscientistsโ€ and โ€œeconomistsโ€ to the the EPA earlier thisย summer.

Heartland’s โ€œRed Teamโ€ Listsย Revealed

Each โ€œmailing list,โ€ revealed below, appears to be an internal listing of Heartland’s experts with comments on theirย suitability.ย 

Heartland Institute’s โ€œClimate Scientists Mailing Listโ€œย 

Heartland Institute’s โ€œClimate Economists Mailing Listโ€œย 

(Note: DeSmog has redacted the personal contact information from theseย lists)

The lists share significant overlap withย long-time climate science denier and retiredย MITย professorย Richard Lindzen‘s list of 300 โ€œscientistsโ€ which was sent to Trump in February 2017. Read Graham Readfearn’s article about that here:ย Climate Science Denier Richard Lindzen’s List of 300 โ€œScientistsโ€ Sent to Trump Is the Usual Parade of Non-Experts.

Here is a spreadsheetย noting the overlap between the Lindzen 300 list and Heartland’s mailing lists (.xls).

Heartland’s โ€œRed Teamโ€ย Approach

Bast listed assorted โ€œthoughtsโ€ and โ€œhighlightsโ€ in the leaked email,ย including:

  • โ€œbe briefing news reporters and news readers at Foxย News.โ€
  • โ€œreach the President by tweeting on theย issue.โ€
  • โ€œhold more congressionalย hearings.โ€
  • โ€œsimplify the issue by focusing on one or only a few arguments andย images.โ€
  • โ€œidentify a few good spokespersons and focus on promotingย them.โ€
  • โ€œstop chasing the other sideโ€™s latest argument and focus instead on the benefits ofย CO2.โ€
  • โ€œfocus on the ‘tuning scandal’ย that discredits theย models.โ€
  • โ€œturn debate from referring to median temperatures to high temperatures, which show noย trend.โ€
  • โ€œfind independent funding forย Roy Spencer,ย David Schnare,ย Willie Soon,ย Craig Idso,ย David Legates,ย etc.โ€
  • โ€œpush Pruitt to start a proceeding for reconsideration of the Endangerment Findingโ€ฆ he wonโ€™t do it withoutย pressureโ€
  • โ€œwe need to be able to say ‘EPAย is reconsidering whetherย CO2ย isย aย pollutant.’โ€
  • โ€œemphasize that we are pro-science and pro-environmentโ€ฆ and the other side isย notโ€
  • โ€œfundamentally challenge, reform, or replace the National Academy of Sciences, the source of muchย pseudoscience.โ€
  • โ€œconduct a new survey of scientists to refute the 97% consensusย claims.โ€
  • โ€œsue a company for not increasing CO2 emissions, force a court to consider the evidence on CO2ย benefits.โ€

โ€œMany people said ‘we need aย PRย plan’ย or a ‘single strategy,’ย otherwise we will continue to lose the battle withย AGWalarmists,โ€ Bast wrote.ย โ€œHeartland,ย CEI, and other organizations and individuals in the room do have plans and strategies [โ€ฆ]ย We can always do better, and will, but we should not stop doing whatย isย working.โ€

โ€œThe briefing revealed that Heartland,ย CEI, Cato, Heritage, and other groups have done a poor job communicating theirย STRATEGIESย to people in the room. More transparency is needed. We tend to hide, or at least not advertise, our playbooks for fear the other side will use them to launch counter-offenses, which we are sure would be far better funded and more warmly received by the media than our own efforts. But we ought to find a way to communicate our plans toย ourย friends.โ€

For additional coverage of the new Heartland lists,ย see:ย 

Climate Investigations Center:ย Heartland Instituteโ€™s Climate Red Team Listsย Revealed

HuffPost:ย Hereโ€™s The List Of Climate Change Deniers Considered For The EPAโ€™s โ€˜Red Teamโ€™ย Debate

RELATED DESMOG INVESTIGATION BY GRAHAM READFEARN:ย EPA Chief Pruittโ€™s ‘Red Team’ on Climate Science Is an Eight-Year-Old Talking Point Pushed by Heartland Instituteย 

Brendan DeMelle DeSmog
Brendan is Executive Director of DeSmog. He is also a freelance writer and researcher specializing in media, politics, climate change and energy. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, The Huffington Post, Grist, The Washington Times and other outlets.

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