Climate Change and the Environment

The Hill Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.): "President Trump and Acting EPA head Andrew Wheeler teamed up with their friends in the fossil fuel industry to release a plan that would open the floodgates to more carbon pollution across the country." "The Administration's proposal is a betrayal of the public trust that fails to uphold the EPA's legal obligation under the Clean Air Act to protect… Read more »

Think Progress Using the USA Today op-ed as a guide, Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) on Wednesday tweeted a list of reasons why Zinke believes wildfires have grown worse in the western United States. The list did not include climate change. “I’d rather hear from scientists about what causes wildfires, but he keeps censoring them,” Beyer said in response to Zinke’s op-ed. The… Read more »

Rep. Don Beyer issued the following statement today after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration proposed to roll back fuel-efficiency standards for cars and trucks: “In one of President Trump’s most significant efforts to undo Obama’s environmental legacy, he solidified his own: prioritize the wish list of big corporate polluters… Read more »

POLITICO House Democrats have asked the Office of Government Ethics to review acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler's meetings with companies that employed him as a lobbyist, Emily Holden reports. Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) and several colleagues sent a letter to the independent agency following reporting from E&E News that Wheeler met with at least three former… Read more »

Rep. Beyer (D-VA) led a group of House Democrats today asking the Acting Director of the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) for a review of recent meetings between Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler and his former lobbying clients. The inquiry followed reporting by E&E that Wheeler met with at least three clients of Wheeler’s former lobbying firm this summer, which may have… Read more »

The Hill A group of House Democrats is calling for the government’s ethics office to investigate acting Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) head Andrew Wheeler's meetings with former lobbying clients. Democratic Reps. Don Beyer (Va.), Raja Krishnamoorthi (Ill.), Pramila Jayapal (Wash.) and Jamie Raskin (Md.) want the Office of Government… Read more »

Think Progress Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) on Friday led a group of House Democrats in sending a letter to the Office of Government Ethics asking it to conduct an investigation to determine whether Wheeler violated his ethics pledge. Beyer is the second-ranking Democrat on the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee and the ranking member of its subcommittee on oversight. The… Read more »

Yahoo News  Staffers for Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., noticed the late-June tweet even as much of Washington obsessed over Pruitt’s latest scandals involving used mattresses and expensive moisturizer. “The fossilized skull of a T-Rex ancestor on display Secretary Zinke’s office is exactly the kind of wonder that Department of Interior should be trying to conserve,” Beyer told… Read more »

Huff Post Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) skewered Zinke in a series of posts to Twitter on Thursday, comparing him to the ousted EPA chief. “Pruitt was not the only Trump Cabinet member with terrible ethics problems, and Zinke’s issues also stem from ignoring ethics guidelines while empowering industry,” Beyer wrote. Click here to read the full article Read more »

The announcement by the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) that it will open a formal investigation of Secretary Ryan Zinke’s real estate dealings with energy giant Halliburton represents the eleventh federal investigation into Zinke opened to date. Most of those investigations are for potential ethical violations. “Scott Pruitt clearly was not the… Read more »