A government watchdog is accusing the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of pre-determining the legal basis for its climate framework.
In an amicus filing before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, Government Accountability and Oversight (GAO), a nonpartisan nonprofit, and Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT), another government accountability watchdog, unearthed communications from inside the EPA in 2009.
Those communications, the GAO argued, show that climate-minded officials treated Obama’s Endangerment Finding as a foregone conclusion and later used it as the foundation for vehicle emission standards, power plant regulations and permitting restrictions. In particular, GAO pointed to communications from Lisa Heinzerling, who served as the climate policy counsel at the EPA at the time.
In a 2009 email, she claimed the right findings would create a legal mandate for regulation.
