EPA's watchdog is scrutinizing ethics practices of agency's former air policy chief
Source: Washington Post
A key architect of the Trump administration’s efforts to weaken federal climate rules is under scrutiny by a federal watchdog for his dealings with industry players who lobbied the government to ease carbon pollution limits.
It is the third inquiry into whether Bill Wehrum, who headed the Environmental Protection Agency’s air policy division from November 2017 until last month, violated federal ethics rules.
The EPA’s inspector general is looking at Wehrum’s interactions with his former law firm as well as several of its clients, who rank among the nation’s major emitters of greenhouse gases linked to climate change, according to two individuals who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.
“This is yet another example where the Trump administration has done just the opposite of ‘draining the swamp,’ by empowering polluting industries and installing those industries’ lobbyists and lawyers at the highest levels of our federal government,” said Sen. Thomas R. Carper (Del.), the top Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/epas-watchdog-is-scrutinizing-ethics-practices-of-agencys-former-air-policy-chief/2019/07/22/469c22be-a8a8-11e9-a3a6-ab670962db05_story.html?utm_term=.485648a83770