ClimateScienceWatch

Promoting integrity in the use of climate science in government

Climate Science Watch is a nonprofit public interest education and advocacy project dedicated to holding public officials accountable for the integrity and effectiveness with which they use climate science and related research in government policymaking, toward the goal of enabling society to respond effectively to the challenges posed by global warming and climate change. See Details

Censorship of Government Scientists

The ability of our society and public officials to make good decisions about climate change depends on uncensored and unimpeded communication about the findings of scientific research and scientifically based assessments of key issues.

House Oversight approves report on political interference with climate science communication

Posted on Wednesday, December 12, 2007

On December 12 the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee approved a majority report that concludes that the Bush Administration politically interfered with climate change science communication and misled policymakers and the public about the dangers of global warming. The Committee was divided. The Republican minority put forward a “Preliminary Minority Views” report that draws conclusions based on unquestioningly accepting at face value misleading statements by Phil Cooney and other current and former administration officials.

House Oversight Committee report contradicts NOAA Administrator Lautenbacher’s testimony

Posted on Wednesday, December 12, 2007

On 16 February 2006, the Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Jr., was asked in a Senate Hearing whether there was White House censorship of communication by NOAA scientists. Lautenbacher responded that he was "not aware that there is any truth to that at all," that he had "never seen anybody to be able to muzzle a scientist," that scientists say "whatever they want to say," and that "we don’t interfere with the ability of our scientists to discuss their peer reviewed science." His statement is contradicted by a report issued on Monday by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

House Oversight report on administration political interference with climate change science

Posted on Monday, December 10, 2007

On December 10 the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), released a proposed report on the results of a 16-month investigation of allegations of political interference with government climate change science under the Bush Administration. The report draws on more than 27,000 pages of documents obtained by the Committee from the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and the Commerce Department. The report draws on and validates information we and others brought forward, and includes material that has not previously been published. On the corrupting influence of CEQ, we told Greenwire: “Everybody was complicit. Everybody knew what was going on, although nobody had the full story, because the tentacles of CEQ were out in so many different directions.”

Webcast and Written Testimony from Senate Hearing on U.S. Global Change Research Program

Posted on Thursday, November 15, 2007

On November 14, 2007, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation held a hearing on “A Time for Change: Improving the Federal Climate Change Research and Information Program.” We provide links to an archived Webcast and to the written statements of the witnesses; soon we’ll have more to say about this interesting hearing. Stay tuned.

Legal deadline today for White House to issue federal science communication principles

Posted on Wednesday, November 07, 2007

President Bush on 9 August 2007 signed into law the America Competes Act, including a provision that requires the Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to "develop and issue an overarching set of principles to ensure the communication and open exchange of data and results" from Federal scientists and to "prevent the intentional or unintentional suppression or distortion of such research findings." The principles are due "no later than than 90 days" after the law was enacted, i.e. no later than today, 7 November 2007. Will the White House comply with the law by meeting today's deadline?

CSW director ABC News Now interview on CDC climate testimony censorship

Posted on Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Climate Science Watch director Rick Piltz was interviewed October 25 on ABC News Now, as part of ABC News coverage of White House censorship of CDC director Julie Gerberding’s Senate testimony on the human health impacts of climate change. See Details for text of the interview.

Censored Testimony from Centers for Disease Control: Update

Posted on Sunday, October 28, 2007

There have been several important developments since the morning of Wednesday, 24 October 2007, when we posted the uncensored draft Congressional testimony from the Center for Disease Control’s Director Julie Gerberding on the relationship between climate change and human health. The Congress has stepped up the presssure; and the White House has responded. The Climate Science Watch research team documents events from Tuesday October 23rd through Friday October 26th 2007.

Climate Science Watch in the News on Controversy over CDC Congressional Testimony

Posted on Saturday, October 27, 2007

On Wednesday morning, 24 October 2007, we posted the uncensored draft Congressional testimony from the Centers for Disease Control’s Director Julie Gerberding on the relationship between climate change and human health. Our posting came shortly after the Associated Press disclosed that Gerberding’s testimony had been “eviscerated” by the White House. The draft subsequently was picked up by journalists covering the story and as the controversy boiled over, Climate Science Watch has continued to provide useful information and analysis to journalists and their audiences.

The censored testimony of CDC Director Julie Gerberding

Posted on Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Climate Science Watch has obtained a copy of the testimony on the health impacts of climate change as drafted by Dr. Julie Gerberding, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This draft testimony was substantially cut by the White House before Dr. Gerberding was allowed to testify before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on October 23. See Details for the document.

White House ‘eviscerated’ Centers for Disease Control testimony on climate change health impacts

Posted on Tuesday, October 23, 2007

More administration global warming censorship? The Associated Press reported that the White House “severely edited congressional testimony given [on October 23] by the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the impact of climate change on health, removing specific scientific references to potential health risks, according to two sources familiar with the documents....It was eviscerated,” said a CDC official familiar with both the OMB-approved testimony and the original censored draft.

Science editor Kennedy: Science community recognizes Administration puts politics before science

Posted on Tuesday, August 07, 2007

"The science community now recognizes that this administration completely puts its political cart before the scientific horse,” Science magazine editor in chief Donald Kennedy told USA TODAY. “We’ve seen it with one issue after another.”

House committee hearing July 31 on Administration politicization of Endangered Species Act science

Posted on Friday, July 27, 2007

The House Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing on July 31 on “Crisis Of Confidence: The Political Influence of The Bush Administration on Agency Science and Decision-Making.” According to a press release from committee Chairman Joe Nick Rahall (D-WV), the hearing was organized in response to a recent report in the Washington Post that revealed how Vice President Cheney’s manipulation in 2002 of the use of science in Interior Department decisionmaking led to the die-off of more than 70,000 salmon in the Klamath River Basin, said to be the worst fish kill on record in the western United States.

Former Surgeon General says Bush political appointees censored science communication

Posted on Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Reuters reports: The first U.S. Surgeon General appointed by President Bush accused the administration on July 10 of political interference and muzzling him from discussing the scientific underpinnings of key issues like embryonic stem cell research. “Anything that doesn’t fit into the political appointees’ ideological, theological or political agenda is ignored, marginalized or simply buried,” Dr. Richard Carmona, who served from 2002 until 2006, told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The New York Times reports that Carmona described attending a meeting at which top officials dismissed global warming as a liberal cause. “And I said to myself: ‘I realize why I’ve been invited. They want me to discuss the science because they obviously don’t understand the science.’ I was never invited back.”

NOAA bureaucrats attempt to muzzle National Hurricane Center director

Posted on Thursday, June 28, 2007

Back in the office after some time on the road and with a lot of posting to do, starting here:
High-level officials in the NOAA/National Weather Service reprimanded the new director of the National Hurricane Center for his comments about how the failure of NOAA to plan expeditiously for replacing the QuikScat satellite could diminish the accuracy of hurricane forecasts. “There is no question they are trying to muzzle me,” said NHC director Bill Proenza.

GAO report questions policies on dissemination of federal scientists’ research

Posted on Monday, June 18, 2007

On June 18 the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report supporting recent criticisms that federal agency media policies hinder government scientists from publicizing their research results. Based on a large survey study, the report estimates that 102 scientists at NASA and 76 at NOAA have been denied approval to disseminate their results for reasons other than those stemming from standard technical review. The report says: “At NOAA, researchers who had requests denied represented a diverse cadre of research areas, including climate, environment, or atmosphere; oceans and coasts; and fisheries and ecosystems. Among the most common reasons that researchers reported for the denial of their requests were that the topic or results were sensitive...” We have noted many times that the gatekeepers interfere selectively, when communication of research findings and interpretations of their significance to a wider public audience might call into question current policies.

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