INSIDE THE GATES

Pruitt Emails Detail Close Ties to Energy Giants, EPA Opponents

During his reign as attorney general of Oklahoma.

Emails spanning the tenure of Scott Pruitt's reign as attorney general of Oklahoma, obtained by The New York Times, detail the new head of the Environmental Protection Agency’s close ties with electric utilities, major oil and gas producers, and outright foes of the organization. The 6,000 pages of emails were the result of a lawsuit by the Center for Media and Democracy, and an Oklahoma judge ordered them released Wednesday. Since his nomination by President Trump, Democrats and EPA staffers have protested Pruitt's ties to energy companies, as well as his long-documented opposition to the agency’s central mission. Matt Ball, an executive at Americans for Prosperity—a Koch brothers-funded nonprofit—sent Pruitt an email in August 2013 that read, “Thank you to your respective bosses and all they are doing to push back against President Obama’s EPA and its axis with liberal environmental groups to increase energy costs for Oklahomans and American families across the states.” He added, “You both work for true champions of freedom and liberty!”