Like a Trump Trojan horse, the gates of the federal government have been opened to climate change deniers, Koch-funded shills, and polluter lobbyists who are infiltrating leadership positions and filling key political posts. A few examples were uncovered by a ProPublica investigation. Doug Matheney, the new assistant to energy secretary Rick Perry, is a former coal lobbyist who once coordinated state work for the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity; Perry’s executive assistant, Michael Brown, is a former manager at a major fracking company; and Mark Maddox, also at the U.S. Department of Energy, formerly lobbied for Big Coal. Over at the U.S. Department of the Interior, serving on the “beachhead team,” is climate change denier Ryan Nichols. And at the White House’s powerful Office of Management and Budget there’s Kerrie Carr, who worked for a power company that led the fight against the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan. These are but a few of the many new agency staffers now tasked with implementing President Trump’s pro-polluter agenda.
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