Late on Friday, the EPA delivered a box of hard-copy documents about the California waiver denial from to Senator Barbara Boxer, theoretically meeting her past-deadline demand for disclosure in advance of Thursday's Senate hearing. The catch, as per the Associated Press-- many documents were either missing or contained numerous redactions. In a letter from Deputy Administrator Christopher Bliley, EPA invoked executive privilege regarding executive deliberations and attorney-client communications, claiming above all that a failure to restrict public release of the documents would have a "chilling effect" on agency decisions [...]
Boxer had threatened to subpoena the agency if it did not turn over the waiver documents. She said she would continue her quest for all the information. Boxer aides said the agency's offer to show her the redacted information privately was not satisfactory.
Apparently 16 pages of a 43-page Power Point presentation were completely blank except for the titles - one of which said "EPA likely to lose suit."
Sen. Boxer is extremely angry about this dodging of federal oversight, calling it "an insult to the American people and a dereliction of duty." There's a hearing about the EPA waiver denial in the Senate Environment Committee scheduled for Thursday, and the Chief Administrator Stephen Johnson will be there. Insofar as Senate committee hearings are must-see TV, this will be one of them.
