With help from Alex Guillén and Anthony Adragna
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— Joe Biden selected Sen. Kamala Harris for his running mate, adding a partner who’s an advocate for environmental justice and nixing the filibuster to his presidential ticket.
— Democratic senators, including Harris, are lining up behind new efforts to expand access to green spaces for communities of color and low-income areas.
— The Interior Department withheld hundreds of pages of documents related to Secretary David Bernhardt’s activities at the agency in the lead-up to his Senate nomination hearings, the department’s internal watchdog detailed in a new report.
HAPPY WEDNESDAY! I’m your host, Kelsey Tamborrino. Bracewell’s Frank Maisano gets the trivia win for knowing there are 14 presidents who originally served as vice president. For today, more VP trivia: Harris is officially the third-ever woman to run as a vice presidential candidate for a major party. Who are the other two? Send your tips, energy gossip and comments to [email protected].
Check out the POLITICO Energy podcast — all the energy and environmental politics and policy news you need to start your day, in just five minutes. Listen and subscribe for free at politico.com/energy-podcast. On today’s episode: What Kamala Harris brings to the ticket on the environment
THAT’S THE TICKET: Former Vice President Joe Biden selected Sen. Kamala Harris of California as his running mate on Tuesday, adding the former blue-state prosecutor and an original co-sponsor of the Green New Deal to his presidential ticket. As president, Biden will “build an America that lives up to our ideals,” Harris tweeted Tuesday. “I’m honored to join him as our party’s nominee for Vice President, and do what it takes to make him our Commander-in-Chief.”
Harris’ selection quickly earned the support of environmental groups, who pointed to her deep record on their issues. “This ticket shows just how committed Joe Biden is to making real and lasting climate progress and stands in stark contrast to Donald Trump and Mike Pence’s efforts to implement a polluter-first agenda,” said EDF Action President Joe Bonfiglio in a statement.
Harris’ climate credentials: During her own 2019 run for president, Harris released a major climate plan that focused heavily on environmental justice, Pro’s Alex Guillén reports. That plan called for $10 trillion in investments from public and private sources to decarbonize the economy, including investments in low-income communities that suffer the most from pollution and climate change. And, last week Harris and progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) introduced the Climate Equity Act to boost the influence of minority and low-income communities.
Notably, Harris has also said she would seek to end the Senate’s filibuster rules, if necessary, in order to pass a Green New Deal — something Biden has signaled he might support. A fact sheet sent to reporters from the Biden campaign on Tuesday also pointed to Harris’ actions to defend the Obama-Biden Clean Power Plan and New Source Standards while she was California attorney general, as well as her suits against big oil corporations like Chevron and BP.
Varshini Prakash, the co-founder of the youth-led Sunrise Movement, said in a statement that Harris has shown a “responsiveness to activist and movement pressure to make climate a top priority, and demonstrated her willingness to be held accountable.”
The fracking fight ahead: President Donald Trump wasted no time Tuesday issuing his first energy attack line on the nomination, knocking Harris’ opposition to fracking and petroleum products. “How do you do that and go into Pennsylvania or Ohio or Oklahoma or the great state of Texas?” Trump said at his coronavirus briefing Tuesday.
The fracking line is of course one Trump has repeatedly gone after Biden for, though Biden has made clear on numerous occasions he has no plans to challenge fracking. Harris, on the other hand, was critical of the fracking technology used to produce oil and gas back in 2016 when she was elected to the Senate, and last year said there was “no question” she favors banning fracking.
Happening today: Biden and Harris will deliver joint remarks from Wilmington, Del.
Let the games begin: POLITICO’s Carla Marinucci has the rundown on who could be selected to take Harris’ seat in the Senate should the Biden-Harris ticket reach the White House. Some of the names on the list will be recognizable to avid ME readers, including California AG Xavier Becerra, who has been at the forefront of legal challenges to the Trump administration’s climate rollbacks.
HARRIS LEADS LETTER ON EQUITY IN PARK ACCESS: With the ink barely dry on the Great American Outdoors Act, H.R. 1957 (116), which offered unprecedented funding for federal parks and public spaces, lawmakers are seeking new opportunities to direct funds into local parks to try to rectify the imbalance in access to recreational sites, Pro’s Anthony Adragna reports this morning.
“The coronavirus crisis is demonstrating that far too many communities do not have access to safe, healthy parks,” 16 Democratic senators, led by Harris, wrote to Senate appropriators in a letter obtained by POLITICO. “Investing in our nation’s urban parks can address this issue while at the same time providing much-needed workforce development opportunities.”
Watch this spot: The House included a record-level of $100 million for the urban parks program in its first minibus, H.R. 7608 (116), which contained funding for the Interior Department.
CHECKING IN ON GRIJALVA: House Natural Resources Chair Raúl Grijalva continues to do well as he fights off Covid-19 following his diagnosis on Aug. 1, according to an aide. “Chair Grijalva is still asymptomatic, feeling fine and focused on getting some rest,” spokesperson Monica Sanchez told ME.
ALL THE DEMOCRATS’ SENS.: Every member of the Senate Democratic conference called on the White House to withdraw William Perry Pendley’s controversial nomination to lead the Bureau of Land Management, citing his public record, “including his advocacy for reducing public lands and access to them, routine attempts to undermine tribes, and climate change denial,” Anthony reports.
WATCHDOG: DOI WITHHELD BERNHARDT DOCS: The Interior Department withheld hundreds of pages of documents related to David Bernhardt’s activities at the agency in the lead-up to his confirmation hearings on the Hill, the department’s inspector general detailed in a new report made public Tuesday. In February 2019, then-counselor to the Interior secretary, Hubbel Relat, instructed Interior’s attorneys who were reviewing a court-ordered release of 1,500 documents “to take all documents related to Bernhardt — addressed to him, sent from him, or referring to him — out of the court ordered document production,” Pro’s Ben Lefebvre reports. In total, the department withheld more than 250 pages of material as the Senate Environmental and Natural Resources Committee was preparing for its March hearings on Bernhardt’s nomination to be secretary.
The report puts Interior Solicitor Daniel Jorjani back in the crosshairs after he testified at his own nomination hearing in May 2019 that he was not involved with any review of documents that were subject to a public information request. The Tuesday report quotes Relat saying he and Jorjani reviewed documents related to Bernhardt and considered some as “sensitive information” due to his nomination. The department eventually released all but 38 pages to the public months after the Senate approved Bernhardt’s nomination.
EPA FINISHES 1-BP CHEMICAL STUDY: EPA on Tuesday issued its second final risk analysis (and summary and support documents) under the updated Toxic Substances Control Act, this time for a solvent called 1-bromopropane, or 1-BP. The final evaluation finds unreasonable risks from 16 of its 25 uses, including in dry cleaning chemicals, spot removers, degreasers, adhesives, sealants, refrigerant flush, and coin and scissor cleaning liquids. 1-BP causes cancer for chronic exposure and developmental toxicity from acute and chronic exposures. The finalization triggers a two-year deadline (with potential two-year extension) for EPA to determine what use restrictions or bans would mitigate those risks.
EPA OFFICIAL SAYS CBA RULE NEEDED BECAUSE OF 100% LAWSUIT RATE: Environmentalists say EPA’s Clean Air Act cost-benefit analysis rulemaking (Reg. 2060-AU51) is a thinly veiled effort to undermine pollution regulations — but an EPA official on Tuesday said it’s necessary because the agency is getting sued so much. During a virtual briefing for the Science Advisory Board, senior air adviser Kelley Raymond said EPA is “currently being sued 100 percent of the time on major air rules” — though Clean Air Act lawyers will tell you the litigation rate under the Obama administration was about that high as well.
Shot: EPA must provide “regulatory consistency” to secure public trust, argued Raymond, a former lobbyist for the National Association of Manufacturers and the Air-Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute. “I’m not saying our internal processes are not good, but I think it’s obvious the public believes that they are not working,” she said, adding: “I can only say I would hope that means we’d be sued less often” after this rulemaking.
Chaser: “Good luck,” quipped SAB member Hugh Barton.
9TH CIRCUIT TAKES UP PEBBLE SUIT: A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco later today will take up a legal fight related to the Pebble Mine just as the Trump administration is deciding whether to grant the copper and gold project its permits. Environmental groups are challenging EPA’s withdrawal of an Obama-era proposal that would have preemptively vetoed mining in the Bristol Bay region, including Pebble. But a district judge in April tossed the case after concluding that the law and EPA regulations meant the withdrawal was a discretionary action and thus not subject to judicial review. Even if environmentalists eventually win this case, it’s unlikely to block Pebble, but it could force EPA to seek to better defend its decision.
Reminder: Opponents of the project include Biden, Donald Trump Jr. and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). Still on the fence: Senate Energy Chair Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). Wild card: Trump.
BIRD’S THE WORD: A federal judge on Tuesday struck down a Trump administration policy change that barred the prosecution of companies or individuals who accidentally kill protected birds, Alex reports for Pros. Interior issued a memo in 2017 saying it would no longer prosecute those who inadvertently harm birds protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, limiting legal penalties to purposeful activities like hunting and poaching. Judge Valerie Caproni of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York castigated the memo on Tuesday as “unpersuasive.”
Interior responds: “Today’s opinion undermines a commonsense interpretation of the law and runs contrary to recent efforts, shared across the political spectrum, to de-criminalize unintentional conduct,” Interior spokesperson Conner Swanson said.
NORTH CAROLINA DENIES MVP PERMIT: North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality denied a key water quality certification for the proposed Southgate extension of the Mountain Valley Pipeline project on Tuesday, citing water quality concerns and uncertainty over whether the main artery of the pipeline will be completed, your ME host reports for Pros. The state DEQ wrote in a Tuesday letter the project would “unnecessarily risk impacting high-quality waters and protected and critical drinking water supplies of North Carolinians.”
Greens cheered the decision as proof that developers should walk away from the Mountain Valley Pipeline project. “Today’s announcement is further evidence that the era of fracked gas pipelines is over,” Joan Walker, a Sierra Club senior campaign representative, said in a statement. A spokesperson for MVP Southgate, however, said the project would “result in no permanent impact on streams, and no permanent loss of wetlands, in North Carolina,” and said it is “currently evaluating its options but continues to target bringing this important project into service in 2021 to meet public demand for natural gas in southern Virginia and central North Carolina.”
N.C. AG LAUNCHES EXPANDED PFAS PROBE: North Carolina AG Josh Stein said this week he is launching an expanded investigation into the source of PFAS contamination in the state. Stein said Monday he will build off of a previous investigation into PFAS contamination from the Fayetteville Works manufacturing facility to look at the extent of damage to North Carolina’s natural resources caused by GenX contamination and other PFAS chemicals, as well as evaluate contamination elsewhere in North Carolina’s surface waters, soil and groundwater.
— “Uniper may have to write down Nord Stream 2 loan if pipeline fails,” via Reuters.
— “Coal giant Murray Energy had affiliation with individuals connected to Ohio coal and nuclear bailout legislation bribery scheme,” via Documented.
— “One dead, nearly 1 million without power in Midwest after severe wind storm,” via NBC News.
— “Germany’s ‘very, very tough’ climate battle,” via POLITICO.
— “Federal workers ready to retire if government forces reopening,” via Bloomberg Law.
THAT’S ALL FOR ME!
