The Washington Examiner is a DC-focused outlet owned by a conservative billionaire (who also happens to own the influential conservative opinion magazine Weekly Standard--which, judging by a recent editorial, seems to be as sick of Pruitt as we are). The Examiner tends to show its conservative hand in its coverage of climate, but also hasn’t given deniers the free rein that many of its counterparts in the right-wing media sphere have.
But on Sunday, the Examiner went past its regular bias with a story claiming that “Trump is a lot greener than you think he is.” The piece uses a greenwashing framing one would expect Trump’s PR team to churn out, trumpeting Trump’s claims that he is “to a large extent, an environmentalist.” Unsurprisingly, the story fails to live up to its headline.
The focus of the piece is the flurry of research and development funding coming out of the Department of Energy. We’re apparently supposed to be impressed that unlike the Trump cabinet members who seek to entirely dismantle their agency and hand it over to the industry they’re supposed to regulate (Pruitt, DeVos, Zinke), Rick Perry is, by contrast, working to really advance energy innovation.
The greatest sin of the piece is one of omission. Nothing is said about all the ways Trump is hurting the environment, or how his administration chooses to ignore or suppress information about public health and the environment.
Instead, the Examiner piece argues, Trump should get green credit because DOE is giving out money for clean coal, nuclear, and yes renewables. One could weigh the potential merits of funding renewables while also keeping the fossil fuel industry alive, or whether or not carbon capture and sequestration, if successful, would actually make coal clean. But that’s not what the piece does, and really not even necessary for anyone paying attention.
The fact of the matter is that the DOE has been dispersing funds--but it’s despite, not because, of Trump’s presidency. The Examiner piece is lengthy, but barely touches on the fact that Trump’s proposed budgets have absolutely gutted DOE’s renewable funding. Turns out Congress are the real heroes here, as they reinstated credits for renewables. Republicans, of course, aren’t going to turn down money for their districts--and clean energy rightly enjoys overwhelming bipartisan popularity across the country.
The Examiner piece praises the ARPA-E funding for clean energy, but Trump’s proposed budget zeroed out funding for ARPA-E. Despite the Examiner’s attempt at spin, the facts speak for themselves: overall, Trump’s 2019 proposed budget reduced clean energy and energy efficiency funding by 72 percent, while upping funding for fossil fuel programs.
Just like Trump’s claims to be an environmentalist, the Examiner’s claim that he’s greener than we think turns an ugly, dirty brown after even the briefest examination.
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