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Lobbyist tied to Pruitt's condo had roster of clients facing EPA

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Lobbyist tied to Pruitt's condo had roster of clients facing EPA

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April 6, 2018

The energy lobbyist whose wife leased a bedroom to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt last year had a roster of clients with business before the EPA, handing fodder to critics who are demanding that Pruitt be fired. J. Steven Hart, the chairman of Williams & Jensen, has said he didn't personally lobby the EPA in 2017 or this year. But plenty of his corporate clients had pending matters with the agency, the lead federal regulator governing air and water pollution nationwide, according to a Bloomberg News review of lobbying disclosures. "J. Steven Hart is a very active lobbyist who has had considerable contact with the EPA and representing numerous clients before the EPA," said Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist for the watchdog group Public Citizen. Top administration officials are deeply skeptical of Pruitt's explanation over how two close aides secured raises worth tens of thousands of dollars over the White House's objection, according to people familiar with the matter. And they are frustrated by the barrage of damaging headlines about Pruitt, from the condo rental to a New York Times report Thursday that aides who questioned him were shifted to other jobs.

Top administration officials are deeply skeptical of Pruitt's explanation over how two close aides secured raises worth tens of thousands of dollars over the White House's objection, according to people familiar with the matter. And they are frustrated by the barrage of damaging headlines about Pruitt, from the condo rental to a New York Times report Thursday that aides who questioned him were shifted to other jobs. Walter Shaub, the former director of the Office of Government Ethics who resigned last year after clashing with the Trump administration, said that under the impartiality rule, Pruitt should have steered clear of all clients of the lobbyists with ownership interests in the condo. "The impartiality regulation addresses when you must recuse from matters involving a person with whom you have a 'covered relationship,'" Shaub said on Twitter. "This lease gave him a covered relationship not only with the landlord but also with anyone in the landlord's firm because the definition of 'person' includes both an individual and the individual's employer." Federal ethics laws are meant to help prevent such ethical taint. For instance, government employees are required to act impartially and prohibited from giving preferential treatment to any private organization or individual. They also are barred from accepting gifts or other items of value from people or entities seeking official action or conducting business with the employee's agency.

One of Donald Trumps sleaziest Cabinet members, Scott Pruitt sued the very federal agency he now heads (EPA) numerous times on behalf of the fossil-fuel industry when he was the Attorney General of Oklahoma. Pruitt has been dismantling the EPA and stamping out environmental regulations at a frantic pace. Under Trump/Pruitt 'stewardship', the US is now the only nation not participating in the global Paris Accords.

A rumor circulating in Washington is that Trump has been considering firing Jeffrey Sessions and replacing Sessions with Pruitt. No need to say what appointing Pruitt as USAG would portend. It's quite obvious.

Related: Scott Pruitt's landlord in controversial deal wasn't allowed to rent out room: Officials
 
Lobbyist tied to Pruitt's condo had roster of clients facing EPA

16fd937f9b2dd30a7eea2913af84417a_M.jpg




One of Donald Trumps sleaziest Cabinet members, Scott Pruitt sued the very federal agency he now heads (EPA) numerous times on behalf of the fossil-fuel industry when he was the Attorney General of Oklahoma. Pruitt has been dismantling the EPA and stamping out environmental regulations at a frantic pace. Under Trump/Pruitt 'stewardship', the US is now the only nation not participating in the global Paris Accords.

A rumor circulating in Washington is that Trump has been considering firing Jeffrey Sessions and replacing Sessions with Pruitt. No need to say what appointing Pruitt as USAG would portend. It's quite obvious.

Related: Scott Pruitt's landlord in controversial deal wasn't allowed to rent out room: Officials

So Pruitt LIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :shock:

Say it ain't so Joe!!!!! :doh:roll:
 
Lobbyist tied to Pruitt's condo had roster of clients facing EPA

16fd937f9b2dd30a7eea2913af84417a_M.jpg




One of Donald Trumps sleaziest Cabinet members, Scott Pruitt sued the very federal agency he now heads (EPA) numerous times on behalf of the fossil-fuel industry when he was the Attorney General of Oklahoma. Pruitt has been dismantling the EPA and stamping out environmental regulations at a frantic pace. Under Trump/Pruitt 'stewardship', the US is now the only nation not participating in the global Paris Accords.

A rumor circulating in Washington is that Trump has been considering firing Jeffrey Sessions and replacing Sessions with Pruitt. No need to say what appointing Pruitt as USAG would portend. It's quite obvious.

Related: Scott Pruitt's landlord in controversial deal wasn't allowed to rent out room: Officials
Ummmm ya we all knew when Trump was elected President back in 2016 that the United States wasn't going to participate in the global Paris Accords.
 
Embattled EPA chief's calendar shows industry had his ear

April 6, 2018

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency head Scott Pruitt held 25-times more meetings with industry representatives than environmental advocates during his first seven months in office, according to a Reuters analysis of his schedule, reflecting the agency's pro-business approach under his tenure. Pruitt, a vocal doubter of mainstream climate change science, has also faced criticism for frequent first-class air travel, spending on costly items in his office, including a $43,000 soundproof telephone booth, and for a trip to Morocco where he promoted U.S. exports of liquefied natural gas – something outside the remit of an environmental regulator. Trump on Thursday said Pruitt was doing a “fantastic job” and was well-loved in “coal and energy country.”

According to the calendar, Pruitt met with representatives of the industries EPA regulates at least 105 times from Feb. 22 to Aug. 10, making up about 77 percent of his total meetings during that period. About half of those industry meetings were with representatives of the oil, gas, coal and mining industries – including executives from companies such as oil major BP Plc , refiner Valero Energy Corp , coal producer Murray Energy, and miner BHP Billiton , according to the records. By contrast, Pruitt met only four times with environmental groups eager to see the EPA limit pollution from those industries. Pruitt also held a number of meetings with conservative policy think-tanks like the Heritage Foundation, and the Family Research Council, a religious group that argues that homosexual conduct is harmful to society, according to the records. A portion of Pruitt's schedule covering his first few months in office had already been released by the EPA, but the latest batch covers the broadest period so far. Pruitt has come under pressure from lawmakers to resign, including three fellow Republicans in the House of Representatives.

Industry has enough organizations, associations, congress-critters, and lobbyists to protect its profit-generated interests.

I want the EPA administrator to protect our environment, not scuttle EPA regulations so industry can rape and pillage our irreplaceable habitat.
 
Ummmm ya we all knew when Trump was elected President back in 2016 that the United States wasn't going to participate in the global Paris Accords.

Perhaps it's the result of the long assault on education, but there are a worrying number of conservatives who don't seem to understand what we have the EPA because we found in the past that letting an unrestrained or barely-restrained free market run rampant lead to countless corporations poisoning the earth, water, and air. They'd probably have poisoned fire as well, if that were possible. Actually, come to think of it....

You see, even though corporations are the best way we've come up with for organizing capital, they still need to be restrained. Otherwise, they will do exactly what they exist to do but will do it without compunction: generate profits. And sadly, they bought enough media and politicians over time, who have brainwashed the masses - or at least, a big enough portion of the masses - to think "bad" whenever they hear the word "regulation." Said dupes will then vote for politicians who want to get rid of regulations, full stop.

But that is terribly stupid and short-sighted, see? Some regulations are indeed poorly thought out, are overly burdensome due to a skewed cost-benefit analysis, or suffer from some other fault. But that in no way translates to regulations are bad mmmkayyy. Yet that italicized phrase is precisely how a serious chunk of regular GOP voters treats it.

They aren't experts in the field. No problem: expertise is now demonized too. They don't have time to study the subject, study the regulation, conduct a cost-benefit, and conclude it is a bad regulation. No problem: regulations are bad mmmkayyy.

It's a damned shame that me and my own may have to suffer because of the stupidity of they and their own. It's not simply that global warming agreements are being ignored. Pruitt's EPA is systematically dismantling all sorts of pollution regulations that have nothing to do with global warming.



Feel free to accidentally further make my point for me with libruls bad type blitherblather.
 
What's interesting is that Price, while certainly corrupt, got the boot while Trump is holding on to Pruitt for dear life even though he's turning out to be a hundred times worse than Price. I don't know what to make of the disparity here.
 
On one of the evening reports, someone gave voice to a position I had wondered about. The "going rate" of $50, when sleeping there, was more than likely an arrangement, let's say. Why complain if Pruitt was late or didn't pay? $50/$0, seems the favorable regulations and peddling LPG was worth much more than $1500 per month, given Pruitt stayed 30 days in a row??


PS What are the chances that Pruitt survives @ EPA and does he need to be confirmed if DJT slides him into a vacant AG slot?
 
What's interesting is that Price, while certainly corrupt, got the boot while Trump is holding on to Pruitt for dear life even though he's turning out to be a hundred times worse than Price. I don't know what to make of the disparity here.

He's apparently rather short on advisers these days.
 
but there are a worrying number of conservatives who don't seem to understand what we have the EPA because we found in the past that letting an unrestrained or barely-restrained free market run rampant lead to countless corporations poisoning the earth, water, and air.

Don't kid yourself. Conservatives fully understand but simply do not care. There are "greed" driven and EPA regulations decrease corporate profits.
 
Don't kid yourself. Conservatives fully understand but simply do not care. There are "greed" driven and EPA regulations decrease corporate profits.

The rich ones, perhaps.

But a lot of conservatives aren't rich or anywhere near it. Getting rid of pollution regs doesn't really help them in the long term, and generally not even in the short term. It's not like they make money when their employer's stock rises a few points because it no longer has to worry so much about where that runoff goes, etc....
 
What's interesting is that Price, while certainly corrupt, got the boot while Trump is holding on to Pruitt for dear life even though he's turning out to be a hundred times worse than Price. I don't know what to make of the disparity here.

Price did not deliver on repealing and replacing Obamacare as tRump expected him to do. tRump didn't think that Price worked hard enough on it.
Conversely, Pruitt has done every dirty deed that tRump has wanted done. Therein lies the difference.
 
Price did not deliver on repealing and replacing Obamacare as tRump expected him to do. tRump didn't think that Price worked hard enough on it.
Conversely, Pruitt has done every dirty deed that tRump has wanted done. Therein lies the difference.

but pruitt is making trump's administration look bad in the headlines
 
The rich ones, perhaps.

But a lot of conservatives aren't rich or anywhere near it. Getting rid of pollution regs doesn't really help them in the long term, and generally not even in the short term. It's not like they make money when their employer's stock rises a few points because it no longer has to worry so much about where that runoff goes, etc....

I know several Conservatives. They are either well off, or strongly desire to be. Even the ones that are of modest means still hold the same set of values as their better off brethren. Their entire lives and thought processes revolve around "the almighty dollar". In fact, a group of them commented to me not so long ago that as long as their 401k's kept getting better, they could care less where tRump wants to stick his dick.
 
but pruitt is making trump's administration look bad in the headlines

Pruitt is a "lackeys lackey" and tRump knows that he will be hard to replace. If it had been anyone else, that person would have already been fired. tRump may have to fire him for public outcry reasons, but he will try and weather it out if at all possible.
 
I know several Conservatives. They are either well off, or strongly desire to be. Even the ones that are of modest means still hold the same set of values as their better off brethren. Their entire lives and thought processes revolve around "the almighty dollar". In fact, a group of them commented to me not so long ago that as long as their 401k's kept getting better, they could care less where tRump wants to stick his dick.

I know conservatives who are not like that. It's a gross over-generalization. It is bad.
 
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