27 Mar 2019 New York Times Interior Nominee Helped Quash Pesticide Report
'....Their analysis found that two of the pesticides, malathion and chlorpyrifos were so toxic that they "jeopardize the continued existence" of more than 1,200 endangered birds, rish and other animals and plants, a conclusion that could lead to tighter restrictions on the use of the chemicals.....Mr. Bernhardt is now President Trump's nominee to become interior secretary. The Senate is scheduled to hold a hearing on his confirmation on Thursday. This sequence of events is detailed in more than 84,000 pages of Interior Department and Environmental Protection Agency documents obtained via Freedom of Information requests by the New York Times and, separately, by the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group that sued the federal government to force it to complete the pesticide studies.
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The decision to block the report represented a victory for the pesticide industry, which has industry allies and former executives sprinkled through the administration....The team concluded had concluded that chlorpyrifos put 1,339 species -- a mixture of animals and plants -- in jeopardy, while malathion put put 1,284 of them in jeopardy and diazinon, a third pesticide that was evaluated, placed 175 species in jeopardy. There are 1,663 species listed as endangered or threatened in the United States, meaning that two of the pesticides may be putting most of them in jeopardy. (This information, agency officials said, was accidentally released in a Freedom of Information response obtained by the Times. They intended to keep this tally a secret, because the assessment was not final.) The agency staff was not recommending that the pesticides be banned. Instead, they were proposing changes in how the pesticides could be used, including possible restriction in their use in areas where endangered species are found, or at certain times of the year, the documents say.
Lawyers who work for the interior secretary's office wanted a different approach. They advocating abandoning the presumption that use of a pesticide by a farmer or a golf course might directly cause the death of or harm to an an endangered species, officials said. Their argument was that because farmers, for example, do not manufacture the pesticide, their use of it means that any harm caused is an indirect effect, as defined under federal law. There is a much higher standard of proof needed to demonstrate that an indirect effect has harmed an endangered species. The law requires that this harm be shown to be "reasonably certain to occur." The revised approach will result in fewer plants and animals being judged to be in jeopardy of extinction as a result of continued pesticide use.....Documents show that the administration does not now expect to make public any draft results of the revised assessment until April 2020, two and a half years later than had been planned.
On Tuesday, after this story was published online, three House Democrats, including Representative Raul M. Grijalva of Arizona, the chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, sent a letter to Mr. Bernhardt asking him to release the draft reports immediately.'
'....Their analysis found that two of the pesticides, malathion and chlorpyrifos were so toxic that they "jeopardize the continued existence" of more than 1,200 endangered birds, rish and other animals and plants, a conclusion that could lead to tighter restrictions on the use of the chemicals.....Mr. Bernhardt is now President Trump's nominee to become interior secretary. The Senate is scheduled to hold a hearing on his confirmation on Thursday. This sequence of events is detailed in more than 84,000 pages of Interior Department and Environmental Protection Agency documents obtained via Freedom of Information requests by the New York Times and, separately, by the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group that sued the federal government to force it to complete the pesticide studies.
....
The decision to block the report represented a victory for the pesticide industry, which has industry allies and former executives sprinkled through the administration....The team concluded had concluded that chlorpyrifos put 1,339 species -- a mixture of animals and plants -- in jeopardy, while malathion put put 1,284 of them in jeopardy and diazinon, a third pesticide that was evaluated, placed 175 species in jeopardy. There are 1,663 species listed as endangered or threatened in the United States, meaning that two of the pesticides may be putting most of them in jeopardy. (This information, agency officials said, was accidentally released in a Freedom of Information response obtained by the Times. They intended to keep this tally a secret, because the assessment was not final.) The agency staff was not recommending that the pesticides be banned. Instead, they were proposing changes in how the pesticides could be used, including possible restriction in their use in areas where endangered species are found, or at certain times of the year, the documents say.
Lawyers who work for the interior secretary's office wanted a different approach. They advocating abandoning the presumption that use of a pesticide by a farmer or a golf course might directly cause the death of or harm to an an endangered species, officials said. Their argument was that because farmers, for example, do not manufacture the pesticide, their use of it means that any harm caused is an indirect effect, as defined under federal law. There is a much higher standard of proof needed to demonstrate that an indirect effect has harmed an endangered species. The law requires that this harm be shown to be "reasonably certain to occur." The revised approach will result in fewer plants and animals being judged to be in jeopardy of extinction as a result of continued pesticide use.....Documents show that the administration does not now expect to make public any draft results of the revised assessment until April 2020, two and a half years later than had been planned.
On Tuesday, after this story was published online, three House Democrats, including Representative Raul M. Grijalva of Arizona, the chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, sent a letter to Mr. Bernhardt asking him to release the draft reports immediately.'
