{"id":31831,"date":"2018-03-02T10:41:15","date_gmt":"2018-03-02T15:41:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=31831"},"modified":"2018-03-02T10:41:15","modified_gmt":"2018-03-02T15:41:15","slug":"emails-reveal-trump-admin-mulling-big-oil-plan-to-transfer-public-land-to-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=31831","title":{"rendered":"Emails Reveal Trump Admin Mulling Big Oil Plan to Transfer Public Land to States"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2018\/02\/28\/interior-department-emails-oil-gas-public-land-transfer\">Emails Reveal Trump Admin Mulling Big Oil Plan to Transfer Public Land to States<\/a><\/h3>\n<article class=\"node-12677 node node-blog node-promoted view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<div class=\"field field-name-field-bimage field-type-image field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/styles\/full_width_blog_image\/public\/blogimages\/31828712651_ceb8305f98_o.jpg?itok=Ifoxa-Bg\" alt=\"Gold Butte National Monument, Nevada\" width=\"826\" height=\"512\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"new-horizontal-social-bar clearfix\">During its first year under <a href=\"http:\/\/desmogblog.com\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a>,\u00a0the <span class=\"caps\">U.S.<\/span> Department of Interior\u00a0has coordinated closely with the oil and gas industry to accomplish\u00a0its priorities on the nation&#8217;s expansive federal lands.\u00a0Among them: considering a plan to transfer\u00a0control of oil and gas development on public lands to the states. This revelation comes from\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/westernvaluesproject.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/OS-2017-001063-Sage-Grouse-Comms-from-Industry.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">emails and documents<\/a> obtained <a href=\"http:\/\/westernvaluesproject.org\/industry-communications-with-interior-and-bureau-of-land-management-on-sage-grouse-overhaul\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">by the Western Values Project<\/a>\u00a0through the Freedom of Information Act (<span class=\"caps\">FOIA<\/span>).<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p>The key coordinator of this plan has been <a href=\"https:\/\/departmentofinfluence.org\/person\/tim-williams\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Timothy Williams<\/a>, who has served as the go-between for the oil and gas industry and Interior Department. Williams, deputy director of the agency&#8217;s Office of External Affairs,\u00a0formerly <a href=\"http:\/\/www.doi.gov\/sites\/doi.gov\/files\/uploads\/17-00644ca.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">served as the field director<\/a> of the Nevada state branch of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/americans-for-prosperity\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Americans for Prosperity<\/a>, a front group founded and funded by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/koch-industries-inc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Koch Industries<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Williams, the emails show, has served as the point of contact for outreach on policy issues for groups such as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/directory\/vocabulary\/5980\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Independent Petroleum Association of America (<span class=\"caps\">IPAA<\/span>)<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/directory\/vocabulary\/8316\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Western Energy Alliance<\/a>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/american-petroleum-institute\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">American Petroleum Institute (<span class=\"caps\">API<\/span>)<\/a> and its state-level branches, and other oil and gas companies such as ConocoPhillips, Chesapeake Energy, and <span class=\"caps\">EOG<\/span> Resources. <span class=\"caps\">IPAA<\/span> is best known as the creator of the front group <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/%E2%80%98energy-depth%E2%80%99-was-created-major-oil-and-gas-companies-according-industry-memo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Energy in Depth<\/a>, which serves as an outspoken voice on issues pertaining particularly to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/fracking-the-future\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">hydraulic fracturing (\u201cfracking\u201d) <\/a>in the <span class=\"caps\">U.S.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The emails also portray discussions of the policy fight over endangered species protections for the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Greater_sage-grouse\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">greater sage grouse<\/a>\u00a0and other regulatory topics, with regular outreach to and input\u00a0received from the oil and gas industry. They further exhibit many examples of Interior Department officials, including Secretary of the Interior <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/ryan-zinke\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Ryan Zinke<\/a>, being invited\u00a0\u2014 and often accepting invitations \u2014 to speak at industry events and\u00a0conferences.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Emails Reveal Trump Admin Mulling Big Oil Plan to Transfer Public Land to States During its first year under Donald Trump,\u00a0the U.S. Department of Interior\u00a0has coordinated closely with the oil and gas industry to accomplish\u00a0its priorities on the nation&#8217;s expansive federal lands.\u00a0Among them: considering a plan to transfer\u00a0control of oil and gas development on public [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,6],"tags":[2688,5317,7844,19038,11481],"class_list":["post-31831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","category-liberty","tag-big-oil","tag-desmog-blog","tag-donald-trump","tag-public-land","tag-steve-horn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31831"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31831\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31832,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31831\/revisions\/31832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}