Trump Team Asking for Energy Department Staff Who Worked on Climate Change, Document Shows

It looks more and more like the swamp is going to be drained.

From ABC News  12/9/2016

President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team appears to be compiling a roster of names of Energy Department staff members, including career civil servants, who worked on plans to cut carbon emissions, according to a questionnaire obtained by ABC News.

Sources at the Department of Energy say the agency received the 74-point memo, which was obtained by ABC News, from the Trump transition team this past Tuesday, Dec. 6. Environmental groups said they fear the questionnaire is an indication of a potential purge of policymakers working to combat climate change.

“It looks like Trump and his administration are planning a political witch hunt which has no place in American government: purging or marginalizing anyone who has worked on the issue of climate change,” John Coequyt, climate policy director at the Sierra Club, an environmental organization, said in a statement. “And that’s at the same time they are looking for ways to eliminate the very scientific infrastructure we need to monitor changes to our planet and its climate. You can’t purge physics from planet earth, and seas will keep rising regardless.”

The questionnaire asks for information on several Department of Energy programs and asks twice for lists of the names of staff members who worked on specific projects. One line item asks for names of any staff or contractors who attended international meetings on climate change run through the United Nations, such as the summit that produced the landmark Paris Agreement last year, signed by 116 countries to cut carbon pollution. A second question in the memo asks for names of personnel who attended domestic interagency meetings focused on the “social cost of carbon.” Those working groups generated metrics and recommendations for the Obama administration to craft new regulations.

Other questions listed, include: “Which programs within DOE are essential to meeting the goals of President Obama's Climate Action Plan?” and “Who 'owns' the work on international Clean Energy Ministerial and 'Mission Innovation' [a multinational effort to develop clean technology]?"

In the past, Trump has called climate change a "hoax," created by special interests that negatively affects businesses.

Trump has yet to tap his energy secretary, but possible contenders include Harold Hamm, the chief executive of oil and gas company Continental Resources, as well as former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.).

The targeted survey of staff in a specific policy area -- one on which Trump has been sharply critical of the current administration -- is unusual, according to Jeff Ruch, the executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit that specifically represents and advocates for public government employees who work in energy and the environment.

“Rather than [saying], ‘give a broad overview and how it all fits together,’ they’re saying, ‘give us all the people that are working on this hot-button issue,” Ruch said.

The Trump transition team did not immediately reply to requests for comment on this story.

“This very much feels like a preview of coming attractions,” a current DOE employee told ABC News on the condition of anonymity. “If there was anybody who didn’t take Trump at his word that he was going to drain the swamp, they should now, except that he is going to drown normal civil servants under this wave of inquisition too.”

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Comment by Eskutassis on December 12, 2016 at 10:16pm

The last line of the ABC post is telling.  If there are "Normal civil servants" who have participated in this charade, they should be vanquished in the swamp sweep.  We have been the ones subject to the "Inquisition" during the last eight years, suffering name calling, threats, humiliation and degradation.  I just want to repeat something our current President told us when he was shoving Obamacare down our throats: "Elections have consequences."  And I would also like to remind that Dirty Harry Reid used the nuclear option to push through legislation and set a precedent.  I knew at the time they would eat those words.  Especially in light of the fact that there are going to be at least two SCOTUS Judges appointed in the next four to eight years.  I really don't see anyone on the opponent's bench ready for four years. Bernie? Kieth Ellison?  Hillary again?  Biden?  They put all their eggs in one basket and the fat lady sat on them.  

I was a gracious loser for too long.  I just can't wipe this smile off my face.

Comment by Barbara Durkin on December 12, 2016 at 11:50am

My comment refers to Long Islander's document link.  Thank you, LI! 

https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3235004/Trump-Transition...

Comment by Barbara Durkin on December 12, 2016 at 11:49am

Team Trump seeks accountability to trim the fat and measure performance!!!  Show us the benefits of our grants and loan guarantees.  Account for your time spent as a public servant and the benefit to the people.  Cut the fat! waste! fraud! and abuse! of citizens by identifying it first!  Trump is following the money and the people who spend it...our money as victims of a rogue and fiscally reckless government.

The Department of Energy is a great starting place to address the cult, religion, and anti-scientific but political-non-solutions that diminish our quality of life. 

It's fun to witness NGOs like Sierra squeal because the Big sWINDle's $170+ billion Green Crony gravy train is now endangered!

I love it!

http://dailysignal.com/2016/12/01/climate-data-deniers-are-trying-t...

Comment by Long Islander on December 10, 2016 at 9:01pm

 

Maine as Third World Country:

CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power

 

Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.

Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT

******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********

(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/

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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law

Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future

"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."

https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/

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