Kavanaugh Also Lied About His Environmental Record

From an Article by Olivia Rosane, EcoWatch.com, October 6, 2018

Protesters demonstrated against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh outside the U.S. Supreme Court on October 3 thru 6 in Washington, DC.

The upper chamber of the Senate is set to vote at 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time Friday on whether to end debate on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. If the motion passes, the Senate could vote whether to confirm him Saturday, CNN reported.

Much of the outcome will depend on whether key swing voters believe Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a party when they were both in high school, or if they accept Kavanaugh’s denials. But anyone paying attention to how he represented his environmental record would have reason to doubt his credibility, The Intercept reported Thursday,

In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Kavanaugh presented himself as pro-environment overall. “In some cases, I’ve ruled against environmentalists’ interests, and in many cases I’ve ruled for environmentalists’ interests,” he said.

But an analysis from Earthjustice found that of 26 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) cases he had written opinions for, he had ruled for rolling back clean air and water protections 89 percent of the time. The Natural Resources Defense Council came out against a Supreme Court nomination for the second time in 25 years to oppose his advance to the nation’s highest court. And an analysis by William Snape, senior counsel at the Center for Biological Diversity, found that in 18 decisions he had made on wildlife cases, including split ones, he had ruled against protecting animals in 96 percent of them.

“He lied. He abjectly lied,” Snape told The Intercept of Kavanaugh’s testimony. “And if he’s going to lie about his record on environmental cases, what’s he not going to lie about?”

In one moment in particular during his testimony on Sept. 5, Kavanaugh said he had upheld environmental regulations in several cases, including what he described as “the Natural Resources Defense Council case versus EPA, a ruling for environmentalist groups.”

When senior NRDC attorney John Walke, who argued the case in question before Kavanaugh, heard his testimony, he was stunned.

“My immediate reaction was, I thought I had misheard him,” Walke told The Intercept. “But as he kept talking, I realized he was talking about my clean air case before him. And then, I honestly could not believe that a federal judge and Supreme Court nominee was misrepresenting my case to U.S. senators in order to bolster his environmental credentials.”

Walke wrote a Twitter thread explaining how Kavanaugh had misrepresented his own ruling. Walke pointed out that Kavanaugh had ruled against the NRDC and the Sierra Club, who had also participated in the case, on three out of four counts. He upheld lax pollution limits for soot, lead, arsenic and other metal emissions from cement plants and let the EPA grant polluters a two-year extension to meet the weakened limits. He only ruled in favor of the environmental groups on a procedural question.

“[T]he claim is revealing because my case was one of his own leading examples of pro-environmental rulings: that it is a very poor example ends up reinforcing the relative paucity of his ‘rulings in favor of environmentalists’ interests,” Walke tweeted.

Dakota Access Pipeline Protest

Federal judge denies tribe’s request for injunction, but federal agencies issue statement pausing pipeline construction

From an Article by Deirdre Fulton, Common Dreams Blog, September 9, 2016 

A series of “game-changing” developments impacting the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) battle on Friday afternoon were testament to the power of organizing.

Striking a blow to the vibrant, Indigenous-led resistance movement that has sprung up against the four-state oil pipeline, a federal judge on Friday denied the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s attempt to halt its construction.

Shortly afterward, however, the Department of Justice, the Department of the Army, and the Department of the Interior issued a joint statement indicating that “important issues raised by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and other tribal nations and their members regarding [DAPL] specifically, and pipeline-related decision-making generally, remain.”

As a result, the statement read, construction on Army Corps land bordering or under Lake Oahe—which straddles North and South Dakota—will be halted until the Corps “can determine whether it will need to reconsider any of its previous decisions regarding the Lake Oahe site under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) or other federal laws.” 

“In the interim,” the agencies continued, “we request that the pipeline company voluntarily pause all construction activity within 20 miles east or west of Lake Oahe.”

The statement continued:

Furthermore, this case has highlighted the need for a serious discussion on whether there should be nationwide reform with respect to considering tribes’ views on these types of infrastructure projects. Therefore, this fall, we will invite tribes to formal, government-to-government consultations on two questions: (1) within the existing statutory framework, what should the federal government do to better ensure meaningful tribal input into infrastructure-related reviews and decisions and the protection of tribal lands, resources, and treaty rights; and (2) should new legislation be proposed to Congress to alter that statutory framework and promote those goals.

As Common Dreams has reported extensively, the Standing Rock Sioux had challenged the Army Corps of Engineers’ decision to grant permits for Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners’ $3.8 billion pipeline, saying that the project violates federal laws—including the Clean Water Act and National Historic Preservation Act—and would endanger both water supplies and ancient sacred sites.

But in his decision (pdf), U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in Washington, D.C., said “the Tribe has not carried its burden to demonstrate that the Court could prevent damage to important cultural resources by enjoining the Corps’ DAPL-related permitting.”

He ordered the parties to appear for a status conference on September 16th. Still, those who have voiced their opposition to the controversial project said they’d fight on. 

In the lead-up to the ruling, tribal chairman David Archambault II declared: “Regardless of the court’s decision today, we will continue to be united and peaceful in our opposition to the pipeline. Our ultimate goal is permanent protection of our sacred sites and our water. We must continue to have faith and believe in the strength of our prayers and not do anything in violence. We must believe in the creator and good things will come.”

Earthjustice, who filed the lawsuit in July on behalf of the tribe, said in the days before the ruling that it would be challenged.

A press conference and protest will take place at the North Dakota Capitol starting at 3pm local time on Friday (today). Solidarity events are planned nationwide next week.

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net