Enviros Sue Trump EPA Over Refusal to Release Heartland Communications

"Environmental groups want documents related to the climate-denying think tank and Scott Pruitt's push for a ‘red team, blue team’ debate on climate science."

"Two environmental groups filed suit Thursday to force the Environmental Protection Agency to disclose its correspondence with the Heartland Institute, a conservative think tank that has led a years-long campaign to discredit climate science.

The complaint by the Southern Environmental Law Center and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) suggests that contact between the EPA and Heartland has been far more extensive than previously known. An EPA Freedom of Information Act official told EDF last year that an agency search had yielded 'between 200 to 600 records' of such correspondence, according to the lawsuit filed in federal court in Virginia.

'EPA's efforts to promote climate change deniers and undermine peer-reviewed science behind closed doors is not only a failure of its mission, it is illegal,' said Kym Hunter, an attorney for the Southern Environmental Law Center. 'The public has a clear and protected right to know what the EPA is doing and with whom they are communicating, including those pushing a climate-denier agenda.'"

Marianne Lavelle reports for InsideClimate News March 15, 2018.