The Centre for Biological Diversity has sued the President Donald Trump administration seeking public records on actions related to the so-called energy emergency.
On day one of his second term, Trump ordered his administration to compile lists of actions that could be expedited to boost production of oil, gas and coal — fossil fuels that pollute the air, water and climate.
Under the executive order, the Office of Management and Budget should by now have received multiple status reports detailing the administration’s progress, but no details have been made public, said a statement by the centre.
“Trump’s so-called energy emergency is just an absurd power grab that his administration is now trying to conceal from the public,” said Ivan Ditmars, an attorney at the Centre for Biological Diversity.
Ditmars added, “Americans have the right to know how the president is operating a shadowy operation to discard vital protections for endangered species and the nation’s wetlands. Trump loves to let his polluting friends and donors profit while the environment suffers, but the law requires his administration to make the dirty details public.”
Under the executive order, Trump directed various agencies to submit to the OMB summary reports of all emergency actions to expedite energy production and bypass the regular protections of the Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act, and other environmental laws.
Agencies were further directed to submit status reports concerning these actions every 30 days throughout the “energy emergency.”
In April, the centre submitted two Freedom of Information Act requests to the OMB seeking these lists, but so far, it has received no documents. In response to one of the requests, the OMB estimated that it would take three to four years to produce the documents.
FOIA is meant to ensure public access to information about the functioning of federal agencies by guaranteeing a response within 20 business days of a request.
Since the start of Trump’s second term, the centre has filed more than a dozen FOIA lawsuits seeking public records of the administration’s anti-environment and anti-regulatory agenda.
These records include emails and other documents detailing plans to rescind the regulatory definition of harm under the Endangered Species Act to eliminate protections for habitat degradation and other “indirect” harms.
This lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
