Investigating Power
The lie is also material politically. The Center for Media and Democracy is gradually releasing Pruitt’s emails, obtained pursuant to a court order in the hopes that the steady drip of embarrassing emails will garner public attention. Pruitt’s statement is material to his very office.
Climate, Democracy, Environment
And speaking of emails: “An environmental group and several Democratic senators are demanding a review of the personal email account of Scott Pruitt, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, after he said during confirmation hearings that he never used that account for official business as Oklahoma state attorney general,” writes the Washington Post.
Climate, Democracy, Environment
The court-ordered release of tens of thousands of Pruitt’s emails, published as part of a lawsuit filed by the watchdog group Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), expose not just the former Oklahoma lawmaker’s cozy relationship with the fossil fuel industry—they also show that many of his official emails were copied to his personal account, contradicting his testimony to the Senate Public Works Committee, whom he told, “I use only my official OAG [office of the attorney general] email address and government-issued phone to conduct official business.”
It’s hard to keep up with it all. But alongside all the rightful focus on Sessions/Trump/Russia, here’s another percolating story of a Trump cabinet nominee lying in his confirmation hearing.
Climate, Democracy, Environment
Scott Pruitt, the EPA administrator, occasionally used private email to communicate with staff while serving as Oklahoma’s attorney general, despite telling Congress that he always used a state email account for government business.
Last week, we learned more. Additional records released – under court order, after an “abject failure” to respond to a two-year-old open records request from the Center for Media and Democracy – further underscore Pruitt’s troubling pattern of transactional relationships.
Climate, Democracy, Environment
U.S. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt won’t have to turn over more documents detailing his relationship with the energy industry for now, after the Oklahoma Supreme Court yesterday stayed a watchdog group’s open records lawsuit.
Climate, Democracy, Environment, Koch
A few days after Pruitt’s February 17 confirmation, over 6,000 pages of his emails were made public. They prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the new head of the EPA has been working hand-in-glove with big oil and gas producers, electric utilities and political groups with links to the billionaire Koch brothers to gut environmental regulations.
Lisa Graves of the Center for Media and Democracy, which sued Pruitt’s office to release the documents, described Hunter’s request as a delay tactic and said she’s confident they will ultimately win the case and receive thousands more emails.
The Oklahoma Supreme Court has granted a request by the Attorney General’s office to delay a lower court’s order requiring the agency to turn over records sought by a watchdog group.
The Center for Media and Democracy sued the agency in February to force it to handover emails sent during the tenure of former attorney general Scott Pruitt, now administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.