We often hear news about the corruption and mafia-like pledges being “requested” within the White House by Donald Trump, but we don’t hear as much about it taking place in other areas of the government.
On Tuesday evening, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow interviewed scientist and former professor Deborah Swackhamer from the University of Minnesota. Swackhamer was asked to change her testimony about the EPA to Congress. Here is the transcription followed by the video.
Maddow: If you personally were called upon to stand up to the President of the United States or a brand-new federal administration in the U.S. government, you could scarcely come to that moment with a better god-given name.
‘My name is Deb Swackhamer and I'm a former professor from the University of Minnesota.’
Swackhamer—You heard her right. Scientist Deborah Swackhamer appeared before Congress last month to testify about the need for robust and independent science and making governmental decisions about public health and safety. Professor Swackhamer was there to give basically a warning about the appearance of politicizing and marginalizing science within the EPA. Down to that hollowing out of academic scientists on the EPA board that she chairs.
We now know that behind the scenes, the EPA was trying to get her to change her testimony so she would be more in line with agency talking points. Professor Swackhamer responded:
“My testimony is submitted and embargoed. I assure you my main message is mine, mine, mine alone, and it is that strong science is needed to ensure public health.”
And then Scientist Deborah Swackhamer went to Capitol hHill exactly as she promised she would, and she delivered her testimony despite that pressure.
Joining us now for the interview tonight is Deborah Swackhamer. She's is Chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors and former Professor of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of Minnesota. Professor, thank you very much for being here. I really appreciate it.
Swackhamer: Thank you for having me.
Maddow: You are currently Chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC) at the EPA.
Swackhamer: That's correct.
Maddow: What is the role of that board?
Swackhamer: This board reports to the Assistant Administrator of Research and Development at EPA and we guide the Assistant Administrator in the research that's done internally at EPA.
Maddow: Okay.
Swackhamer: So, it's all about just what's going on in EPA. We don't deal with regulations. We don't deal with policy. We're dealing with kind of the basic science that's going into eventually maybe to support regulations. But we're overseeing that science and giving advice on is it the right science? Are they doing it with the best methodology? Is it, you know, the gold standard? Is it going to withstand scrutiny when it goes..
Maddow: So you're helping the decision makers, the active decision makers at EPA make sense of and understand the Import and the solidity of the science that's going into EPA decisions?
Swackhamer: And it's even a little further upstream than that. Is it good science? Is it the right science?
Maddow: What is the state of that board now?
Swackhamer: Well, many of the—most of the members have been told they are not going to be continued into a second term, and so the board that used to be about 68 members is now going to end up being 11 members as of September 1, because so many of those members were going to have the first term renewal, but now those members aren't going to have a first term renewal. So basically the board has been kind of decimated. And our activities have been essentially suspended. We're sort of in suspended animation because all of our future meetings have also been canceled.
Maddow: All of your future meetings?
Swackhamer: Yes. We had six scheduled in the fall, and then we were in the process of deciding how those—what the agendas were going to be and how those meetings were going to move forward. And they all were canceled because there are no committee members to attend them. We don't have enough warm bodies to keep BOSC going. BOSC is the acronym.
Maddow: Given what the role of this board is, which seems crucial when you describe it in the terms you just did, is it your sense that EPA is replacing the role of this this science advisory board with something else? Are they getting advice on how to interpret scientific problems and scientific work and the science done within the EPA from people other than the scientists who used to do it? How they’re going to be doing that unless they're doing it internally.
Swackhamer: If you're going to have really good science to support strong regulations because you go to court and have to have robust science in order to withstand that, you have to have peer review of that science.
So you do the science, and then I look at it as an outsider, and I say, you know, you could have tweaked this, or maybe you want to do that, or you didn't Include this study and you should have, you know. Then you're getting that outside review, a fresh set of eyes, an objective review. Without that, you can really go astray. You really don't have strong science.
So EPA is going to continue to do science, but they're not going to have that really strong outside, independent viewpoint for some time because BOSC, it's going to take them six to nine months to probably get that repopulated, get new meetings scheduled and actually do Anything. So they're going to miss about a year of valid, important, kind of critical science advice. It's a very critical time right now for them.
Maddow: How unusual was it for you to get this pressure that you got grom the new chief of staff at the EPA about your congressional testimony?
Swackhamer: Well, it was highly unusual for me, because I've only testified in front of Congress a few times. So that alone was a pretty unusual experience. But getting these e-mails the night before was very disturbing. It was very—have to say I was pretty intimidated because I had made it very clear to everyone that I was testifying as an independent scientific expert, and I was not testifying as an EPA witness. And I had told EPA that and cleared it with their ethics folks. So I knew what I could and could not do given that I was also chair of this committee. So I was following what I thought were the right rules, and after the first exchange of E-mails, we kind of sorted out that I'm not an EPA witness. But then I kept getting these e-mails. And then I got that final e-mail which was, ‘We want you to change Your testimony.’ And it was a minor point, but it was changing the message I was giving. It was changing the wording, and I thought who are they to be telling me what I'm supposed to be saying when it's my testimony? And further more, I've already submitted it. So I was very intimidated by that. I wasn't happy about that.
Maddow: And you gave your testimony as you intended to give your testimony.
Swackhamer: Absolutely.
Maddow: Deborah Swackhamer, chair of the EPA’s Board of Scientific Counselors, thank you for helping us understand this at all levels. And thank you for what you did.
In another era, this would almost be impossible to imagine, but in Trump’s America…
Another hero among a stockpile of Republican scoundrels. Thank you, Professor Swackhamer and thank you to the Scientific Resistance.
