Emails Reveal Pruitt and EPA Coordinating with Climate-Denying Heartland Institute

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A lawsuit filed in March by the Southern Environmental Law Center and Environmental Defense Fund has revealed new levels of coordination between Scott Pruitt‘sย Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the climate science-denying think tank the Heartland Institute.

The EPA had repeatedly failed to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests by the two groups, which resulted in the lawsuit and subsequent release of the emailย communications.

However, both the EPA and the Heartland Institute have strongly defendedย their actions revealed by the newly released emails. EPA spokesperson Lincoln Ferguson told the Associated Press that communications with the Heartland Institute helped โ€œto ensure the public is informedโ€ and that this relationshipย โ€œโ€ฆ demonstrates the agencyโ€™s dedication to advancing President Trumpโ€™s agenda of environmental stewardship and regulatoryย certainty.โ€

The current head of the Heartland Institute is former Congressman Tim Huelskamp who also was quick to defend theย relationship.

โ€œOf course The Heartland Institute has been working with EPA on policy and personnel decisions,โ€ Tim Huelskamp said in a statement to AP. โ€œThey recognized us as the pre-eminent organization opposing the radical climate alarmism agenda and instead promoting sound science andย policy.โ€

In March Huelskamp wrote a piece in The Hill titled โ€œScott Pruitt is leading the EPA toward greatness,โ€ in which he made it quite clear that the reason for this greatness was that โ€œTrump and Pruitt share an understanding that climate change is not a significant threat to the prosperity and health ofย Americans.โ€

While in Congress, Huelskampโ€™s top donor was Koch Industries, the massive petrochemical empire owned by the conservative billionaire Koch brothers, Charles andย David.

However, this latest revelation is unlikely to derail Pruittโ€™s career at the EPA. Pruitt is currently the subject of at least ten investigations. At a scathingย hearing in April, he was told by one Congressman that โ€œyou are unfit to hold public office and undeserving of the publicย trust.โ€

Still, Pruitt remains the emabattled chief of the nation’s top environmental agency under Trump, and, perhaps not surprisingly, President Donald Trump has been supportive ofย Pruitt.

Like his boss, Pruitt is quick to blame the media for hisย problems.

โ€œMuch of what has been targeted towards me and my team, has been half-truths, or at best stories that have been so twisted they do not resemble reality,โ€ Pruitt said in his opening remarks to Congress during the April hearing. โ€œI’m here and I welcome the chance to be here to set the record straight in these areas. But let’s have no illusions about what’s really going onย here.โ€

Soย what is really going onย here?

Heartland Institute: Pushing Disinformation on theย Public

The Heartland Institute is a notoriousย climate denial organization which has mailed tens of thousands of books that attacked climate science to public schoolย science teachers. The group held a press conference to attack Pope Francisย when he spoke about climate change in 2015. And in 2012 Heartland put up aย billboard comparing those who believe thatย global warming is real to the Unabomber Ted Kaczynski.

Supported by funding from the Koch network, Heartland has been actively spreading disinformation about climate science forย years.

What theย latest EPA emails reveal is the extent which these Koch-funded climate deniers are now in direct communication with the EPA and helping influence policy. One email from John Konkus, EPAโ€™s deputy associate administrator for public affairs, assures Heartland’sย then-president Joseph Bast that โ€œIf you send a list, we will make sure an invitation isย sent.โ€

The list refers toย Heartlandโ€™s recommendationsย for economists and scientists that the EPA would invite to a public hearing on science standards. Under Trump and Pruitt, climate science deniers are now hand-picking whoย advises the EPA on climate changeย science.

The emails also show EPA officials communicating with the Heartland Institute to try to rally โ€œactivistsโ€ to support the repeal of the Obama administration’s signature, if moderate, climate change program, the now under siegeย Clean Power Plan, which would regulate greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired powerย plants.

Kym Hunter, attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center, explained the rationale for the lawsuit seeking the email communications withย Heartland.ย 

โ€œEPAโ€™s efforts to promote climate change deniers and undermine peer-reviewed science behind closed doors is not only a failure of its mission, it is illegal,โ€ Hunter said. โ€œThe public has a clear and protected right to know what the EPA is doing and with whom they are communicating, including those pushing a climate-denierย agenda.โ€

Main image: EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt speaking at CPACย 2018.ย Credit:ย Zach Roberts forย DeSmog

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Justin Mikulka is a research fellow at New Consensus. Prior to joining New Consensus in October 2021, Justin reported for DeSmog, where he began in 2014. Justin has a degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Cornell University.

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