Free Republic

Drinking water and the “human food chain” affecting thousands of people are seriously threatened, because the Environmental Protection Agency polluted a Colorado river with toxic metals waste, a government document shows.But that’s not what EPA has been telling the public since the agency’s August 2015 accident that turned the Animas River yellow for nearly two weeks, threatening the main source of drinking and working water for residents in three states and the Navajo Nation.The EPA polluted the Animas River with 880,000 pounds of dangerous metals like lead and arsenic after it intentionally breached the Gold King Mine in August. EPA released a statement shortly...

The Senate Indian Affairs Committee acted Wednesday to subpoena EPA administrator Gina McCarthy after the agency refused to provide witnesses to a field hearing on the EPA-caused Gold King Mine spill. Chairman John Barrasso, Wyoming Republican, and vice chairman Jon Tester, Montana Democrat, said they had agreed to issue the subpoena ordering Ms. McCarthy or assistant administrator Mathy Stanislaus to testify at the April 22 hearing in Phoenix, Arizona. Mr. Barrasso said the subpoena would be served on the EPA later Wednesday. Committee members blasted the EPA for its lack of cooperation in aiding the panel in its oversight role...

New exhibition shows how tribe dealt with blowout last August. Navajo artist Venaya Yazzie wrote the Diné expression – Tó éí ííná – beside a photograph of a friend sullenly looking out on the tainted San Juan River in the days after the Gold King Mine spill. It means “Water is Life,” and for the indigenous tribes affected by the mine blowout in August, the words sum up months of confusion, fear and sadness surrounding the health of critical southwest waterways. On Aug. 5, the Environmental Protection Agency breached the portal of the mine north of Silverton, sending an estimated...

“Time and time again, the Federal government has breached its promises with respect to the public lands. Western states are moving to compel the Federal government to honor the same promise it made and kept with all states east of Colorado: to timely dispose of the public lands so they can be managed by those whose lives and livelihoods depend upon the wide management of those lands.” - American Lands Council When the western states were asked to join the union, they each agreed to sign a compact with the federal government much as the eastern states had done. The...

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials refuse to answer two questions surrounding the August 2015 Gold King Mine spill that would help resolve issues uncovered by a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation. TheDCNF reported numerous contradictions in the EPA’s explanation of how and why it intentionally breached Colorado’s Gold King Mine, releasing 880,000 pounds of dangerous metals and mining waste into drinking water for three states and the Navajo Nation. Yet, the EPA refused to clarify those contradictions and instead disregarded TheDCNF’s findings and clung to its original story. First, the EPA ignored the conflicts of interest surrounding the “independent” investigation...

Obama administration officials called the Gold King Mine disaster in Colorado an “accident,” but an analysis of government documents and public statements makes clear the disaster was anything but accidental. The Environmental Protection Agency intentionally opened up the abandoned mine, which unleashed 3 million gallons of toxic waste into nearby rivers that residents of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and the Navajo Nation depend upon for drinking water. Agency administrator Gina McCarthy even called the mine spill an “unfortunate accident” in an Aug. 11, 2015, speech on the matter, but EPA officials have since been more cautious in describing the event....

The Environmental Protection Agency is spending nearly $300,000 to develop technology that will track the energy and water use of office buildings, with a colored light bulb system that will send "visual messages" to employees when they are using too much.

The Republican chairman of a congressional panel investigating a 3-million-gallon spill of toxic wastewater from an inactive Colorado gold mine said Tuesday the mine was purposely breached by a government cleanup team. The assertion by House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop of Utah contradicts claims by the Obama administration that the cleanup team was doing only preparatory work at the Gold King mine. Once it was breached, wastewater loaded with lead, arsenic and other contaminants fouled downstream rivers in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah. Bishop cited an email in which an Interior Department official said the spill last August...

ination to the Supreme Court made by President Barack Obama, the White House is surely gearing up for a strategic nomination and epic battle for the future of the highest court in the country. Obama needs to move forward quickly with a transformative nominee who stands a chance of success on Capitol Hill. Diane Humetewa, U.S. District Judge for the District of Arizona is perhaps the most likely person to advance through Senate confirmation during Obama's final year in office. Nominating her would transform the federal judiciary, bring Native Americans into the highest echelons of political society, and actually stand...

The head of the New Mexico Environment Department blasted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday during a legislative committee meeting in the New Mexico Legislature, saying federal officials are downplaying the long-term effects of the Gold King Mine spill. ... Environment Secretary Ryan Flynn told members of the House agriculture committee that the agency has been pressuring communities to get behind a proposal that calls for monitoring water quality for only a year. Flynn also argued that the proposal would look at whether the water is safe for recreation rather than digging deeper into recurring spikes in the readings...

On Aug. 5, 2015, contractors for the Environmental Protection Agency accidentally released 3 million gallons of contaminated wastewater into Cement Creek, a tributary of the Animas River. Six months later, questions about the effects of spring runoff, Superfund status and remediation remain unanswered.N.M. official blasts EPA over Gold King spill‘When storm events occurred, the sediment was remobilized’ Where the Animas goes The Gold King Mine blowout on Aug. 5, 2015 sent 3 million gallons of wastewater into the Animas River, which flows into the San Juan River. The San Juan flows into the Colorado River. The Colorado River is dammed,...

It's well known that many Republicans in Washington do not like Sen. Ted Cruz, but the full extent of that antipathy is coming to light this week as several current and former lawmakers say they prefer Donald Trump as the GOP nominee, although they have little regard for either man. Some GOP consultants and strategists started the rumblings in recent days. Then Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad told Republicans in his state to oppose Cruz because of the senator's opposition to ethanol subsidies. But the story broke wide open on Wednesday when former Senate Majority Leader and 1996 Republican presidential nominee...

...now it gets interesting.

Except, weirdly enough, those in Detroit city government I've held off on writing about the Flint water disaster here thus far (although I've dealt with it a couple of times in my Detroit News column) because it seems we learn more every day about what happened and why. Sadly but predictably, Michigan media have treated it mainly as a political story, with the early narrative being something along the lines of "Republicans stick Flint with toxic water to save money." That has prompted absurdities like Michael Moore (who grew up in Flint by the way) showing up and demanding that...

What we learned from Hurricane Katrina: No matter what happens, it's never the governor's fault. What we've learned from the contaminated drinking water in Flint, Mich.: It's always the governor's fault. A bit of background first. Flint has relatively high levels of lead in its drinking water, a cause for legitimate concern. This is a result not so much of the source of its drinking water, the Flint River, as of the city's failure to treat the water, which, without the proper additives, leaches lead and other contaminants from pipes. Prior to and separate from the current water crisis, Flint...

Big Guy visited Detroit yesterday to take another victory lap for having saved GM (and whacking bin Laden). BO visits a Detroit-based Shinola store proving he knows…well, you know.While he was in Motown BHO addressed the ongoing water crisis in Flint, Michigan which is 70 miles northwest of Detroit (not that it matters butt Flint is ranked the 10th most liberal city in America, just behind San Francisco). President Barack Obama, in Detroit on Wednesday for his first visit to the North American International Auto Show, weighed in on the Flint water crisis at the top of his speech to...

Saying the people of Flint deserve the truth about the city's water, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder has released more than 250 pages of his emails that relate to the crisis. But the document dump Wednesday did little to ease the predicament he finds himself in. With each passing day, the chorus for him to step down has grown louder because the water debacle unfolded under his watch. "So far, all roads lead to Lansing when it comes to accountability," Democratic U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, who represents the Flint area, said Wednesday. The emails help show, at least in part, how...

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder apologized to the residents of Flint for a water crisis that has prompted outrage, federal scrutiny and lawsuits, vowing to seek long-term assistance for the city’s residents. In his State of the State address on Tuesday night, Snyder said he was asking state lawmakers for $28 million to help residents reeling after Flint’s drinking water became contaminated with dangerously high levels of lead. He also vowed to release his emails related to Flint from 2014 and 2015.

DETROIT -- Commenting for the first time on the lead contamination in the drinking water of Flint, Mich., President Obama said Wednesday that he "would be beside myself" if he were a parent in the city. Mr. Obama said that in a White House meeting on Tuesday with Flint's mayor, Karen Weaver, "I told her that we are going to have her back, and all of the people of Flint's back, as they work their way through this terrible tragedy." The long-running crisis, which has poisoned dozens of Flint residents, at least, and left tens of thousands of others unsure...

See if you can tell that I'm angry. Sean Penn is the dolt who fancies himself as a journalist while surrendering all editorial control to his subject, a drug lord and murderer. CBS This Morning has decided to enroll in the Sean Penn School of Journalism. The Hillary whores hosts at CBS This Morning spent an entire segment of the show painting Michigan Governor as the bad guy in the Flint Michigan tainted water scandal. They likened it to a "Katrina moment." The segment then turned entirely into a Hillary Clinton campaign commercial. Everything centered around what Hillary had to...