EPA Chief Promises To Go After Republicans Who Question Agency Science

The Daily Caller ^ | 4-28-2014 | Michael Bastasch

[servo1969]

Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy has issued a warning to Republicans who continue to question the integrity of the agency’s scientific data: we’re coming for you.

McCarthy told an audience at the National Academy of Sciences on Monday morning the agency will go after a “small but vocal group of critics” who are arguing the EPA is using “secret science” to push costly clean air regulations.

“Those critics conjure up claims of EPA secret science — but it’s not really about EPA science or secrets. It’s about challenging the credibility of world renowned scientists and institutions like Harvard University and the American Cancer Society,” McCarthy said, according to Politico.

“It’s about claiming that research is secret if researchers protect confidential personal health data from those who are not qualified to analyze it — and won’t agree to protect it,” she added. “If EPA is being accused of secret science because we rely on real scientists to conduct research, and independent scientists to peer review it, and scientists who’ve spent a lifetime studying the science to reproduce it — then so be it.”

Republicans Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana and Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas have led the charge on pressing the EPA to make publicly available the scientific data behind its clean air regulations. McCarthy promised she would make such data publicly available during her confirmation process last year. Now her refusal to cough up the data has angered Republicans.

“EPA’s leadership is willfully ignoring the big picture and defending EPA’s practices of using science that is, in fact, secret due to the refusal of the agency to share the underlying data with Congress and the American public,” said Vitter.

“We’re not asking, and we’ve never asked, for personal health information, and it is inexcusable for EPA to justify billions of dollars of economically significant regulations on science that is kept hidden from independent reanalysis and congressional oversight,” Vitter added.

The EPA has used non-public data to justify 85 percent of $2 trillion worth of Clean Air Act regulation benefits from 1990 to 2020. The agency also uses such datasets to assert that Clean Air Act regulation benefits exceed the costs by a 30:1 ratio originates from the secret data sets.

House Republicans have backed a bill that would block the EPA from crafting regulations based on “secret” data. Republicans argue that such data was used to craft onerous regulations, like one promulgated in late 2012 to reduce soot levels.

That soot rule is supposed to yield $4 billion to $9 billion in benefits per year, while costing from $50 million to $350 million, but the data backing that claim up is not publicly available.

“For far too long, the EPA has approved regulations that have placed a crippling financial burden on economic growth in this country with no public evidence to justify their actions,” said Arizona Republican Rep. David Schweikert, who introduced the bill.

“Virtually every regulation proposed by the Obama administration has been justified by nontransparent data and unverifiable claims,” said Smith, who cosponsored the bill. “The American people foot the bill for EPA’s costly regulations, and they have a right to see the underlying science. Costly environmental regulations should be based on publicly available data so that independent scientists can verify the EPA’s claims.”

[servo1969]

While the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works approved the nomination in a vote along party lines on May 16, the nomination was stalled on the Senate floor. In the interim, Bob Perciasepe served as the EPA's acting administrator. David Vitter, the ranking Republican on the Committee, posed 600 of a total 1,100 questions, to McCarthy. The Committee Republicans had demanded responses from McCarthy on five "transparency requests." The Republicans' delay of the nomination makes it the longest period on record that the agency has been without a leader. Christine Todd Whitman, a former Republican governor of New Jersey and EPA administrator under President George W. Bush, stated: “It’s not about [McCarthy], it’s about the agency... Republicans lost the [presidential] election and they have to realize that this is the president’s choice of nominee. They can go after the president, but Gina McCarthy should get an up-and-down vote.” On July 18, 2013, the Senate confirmed McCarthy as the 13th Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency by a vote of 59-40.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

[mazda77]

Hit ‘em again! Harder, Harder!

[bubbacluck]

That “chill wind” is picking up steam.

[Gaffer]

Yes. There were government functionaries multiple decades ago that promised much the same thing....to go after those who dissent with government’s work and actions.

They were called NAZIs, and they murdered over 6 million Jews and threw the world into a conflagration that killed much, much more.

One wonders who these compassionate liberal goons are targeting in this time.

I see this face, I see arrogance and hatred and intolerance for opposition.

[Maceman]

it is inexcusable for EPA to justify billions of dollars of economically significant regulations on science that is kept hidden from independent reanalysis

If the evidence and findings are not available for independent reanalysis, then it is by definition NOT science.

[BenLurkin]

Pull the plug on the EPA.

It outlived any possible justification for its existence decades ago.

[OldNavyVet]

Beliefs belong in church, and facts belong in making decisions.

[FlingWingFlyer]

The Nazis are feeling their oats. The regime says to ST*U! You better believe the vomit it is spewing or you’re going to be toast. Nice country we have here. More of that “fundamentally transformed” BS.

[logic101.net]

Just like all fascists, dissent is not allowed or tolerated.

[US Navy Vet]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_David_Dealey

[Westbrook]

Science, by its very nature, is NEVER “settled”.

Neils Bohr and Albert Einstein would’ve roasted these pigs. They had no fear of such gummint cabals.

[US Navy Vet]

G*D DAMN RICHARD M NIXON!

[DesertRhino]

Unreal, she’s openly threatening the people who appropriate her funding, and her very paycheck. Cut off her damned funds, every penny until she learns. Then keep ‘em cut off a little longer just to make sure she really gets it.

But the repubs will whine and maybe Issa will threaten to look into it.

[dhs12345]

I would pose the comment this way:

“The EPA must be hiding something if they refuse to provide all of the reports, studies, and data.”

[txrefugee]

LOL…the American Cancer Society??? That bunch of grifters, who collect big bucks to pay their administrators lavish salaries, but couldn’t jar loose with a few bucks for a wig for a cancer patient I know? This woman should be fired for being just another stupid woman hired by our even more stupid president.

[Zathras]

Harvard is mostly known for churning out Lawyers.
American Cancer Society is a non-profit.
These are good examples of “Scientists”?

Normally making public threats is considered actionable by law enforcement.

[puppypusher]

I’d give her a down vote.The Republican’s have to get a hold on this E .P.A . and devolve a lot of its authority so they’ed be required to go to congress to pass any additional regulations.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Tar.
Feathers.

[TexasCajun]