In April, we noticed that a very PR-savvy fisherman named Jerry Leeman was doing quite a press tour to falsely claim offshore wind is bad for the fishing industry. We wondered if perhaps someone who manipulates media and minds professionally was helping out an otherwise normal-seeming blue-collar fisherman. We thought maybe there'd be a medium-sized fish or two lurking in the depths. Turns out maybe it was none other than the white whale of liars-for-hire…
Because our dear anti-wind turbine fisherman Jerry Leeman is giving up the sea for a different bounty: lobbying. Leeman is now leading a new fishing industry lobby group that's suspiciously anti-offshore wind, and we have some very fishy clues that the group is connected to larger fossil fuel industry players.
First off, the New England Fishermen Stewardship Association’s (NEFSA) "Mission" page and Leeman's own Facebook posts use Steve Milloy's tobacco industry-developed "sound science" language, a catchphrase used specifically to cast doubt on science that is perfectly accurate.
One of the tricks in the disinfo playbook that Milloy ran for Big Tobacco before running it for fossil fuels is to endlessly call for more research and better studies, which is a stalling tactic to postpone regulation without looking like you're acting in bad faith. In order to undercut the science showing their industries have a problem, disinformers demand "sound science" and then hire consultants to produce industry-friendly studies they claim are the "sound science" alternative to whatever shows a problem for their profits.
So it's not necessarily that no one legitimate or sincere has ever used the phrase, but Leeman is using it in exactly the way that career liars use it to serve their industrial backers like, for example, when Milloy led the "Advancement of Sound Science Coalition" for tobacco giant Philip Morris.
And what do you know! The very first person to follow NEFSA’s Twitter account, before even Jerry Leeman and other NEFSA employees, was Steve Milloy himself, whose Twitter handle, @JunkScience, is the continuation of his work to attack the science underpinning secondhand smoke regulations.
NEFSA’s second follower? Matt Whitlock, whose Twitter bio begins with "Republican communicator. Former: @NRSC, @SenOrrinHatch, @SenMikeLee, corporate comms."
Not only that, but NEFSA also promotes Milloy's anti-wind op-eds in the donor-driven Daily Caller, complete with slickly produced quote cards that are clearly professionally created for sharing on social media.
True to the disinformation playbook, the group is arguing the intricacies of NOAA's record-keeping, which sort of breaks with the hearty, down-home, 'just some humble fisherfolk' vibe captured by their catchphrase "fight salty." This tactic just so happens to fit perfectly with Milloy's remit of using the pretense of scientific uncertainty as a tool to forestall government action potentially impacting profits.
Otherwise, though, NEFSA’s staff is mostly credible local types, with one exception. The group’s Board Member and Research and Development Director Robert Burke has fundraised and argued in the past that right whales are actually doing fine so there's no need for regulations on lobsters, which doesn't exactly square with the narrative that offshore wind is a threat to right whales. Maybe that's why he's not listed on NEFSA’s Team page?
But who is listed? A bunch of real fishing industry folks, though it would appear the group’s one-year selectman candidate and “P&V Outreach” Director's Facebook page is a mix of normie stuff you'd expect from someone who still uses Facebook, anti-wind memes, serious content attacking offshore wind, Tucker Carlson clips about Ukraine, and a repost of a message calling President Biden "a walking talking marionette chameleon with a mind turned to cottage cheese" and VP Kamala Harris, former senator and top law enforcer for the largest state in the country, "an airhead political grifter who had the flavor of skin and anatomy that pleased the virtue signaling wokesters."
But this is definitely about offshore wind and fish, or whales, or whatever…
