Lie to Congress Day

PRESENTED BY POOP FROM A BUTTHOLE

Yesterday was Lie To Congress Day!

Fracking executive turned Energy Secretary Chris Wright, lying to Appropriations-Energy ranking member Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio): “We have not frozen funding.” The department is subject to multiple injunctions and restraining orders against its illegal funding freezes.

Koch operative turned Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, lying to Appropriations-Agriculture ranking member Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), after soliciting deferred-resignation program (DRP) layoffs in the Farm Service Agency (FSA) and Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) offices: “In the last round, we did not accept any DRPs from anyone in FSA offices or APHIS offices or state veterinarians.” She further claimed no knowledge of plans to close FSA offices or fire FSA employees.

Bonus: Insurrectionist turned FBI Director Kash Patel, telling the truth to Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.): “You’re accusing me of committing perjury!”

Because he did commit perjury.

On Tuesday, Rollins went on Fox Business to gleefully state, “We’re not doing climate change crud any more.”

The International Energy Agency finds that under the Biden administration, methane pollution from the oil and gas industry was wildly under-reported. Well, that’s going to get worse.

Human-caused climate change led to 15,000 additional deaths from wildfire air pollution in the continental United States during the 15-year period ending in 2020.

Andrew Freedman, now at CNN, with another brutal story: the Trump climate-denial regime is shuttering NOAA’s billion-dollar disaster database.

Natalie Alms and Eric Katz report that the Interior Department is finalizing reduction-in-force plans expected to target thousands of employees, including 1,500 at the National Park Service, with notices going out to employees within 10 days. The U.S. Geological Survey will lay off around 1,000 employees—focused on its Ecosystems Mission Area.

Liza Gross reports on a lawsuit filed yesterday by California and 16 other states, charging Trump and Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy with illegally withholding the $5 billion Congress allocated to states for EV-charging infrastructure.

The entire team at the National Cancer Institute’s PDQ (Physician Data Query) Cancer Information has been fired.

Ryan Cooper gives a eulogy for the Department of Energy Loan Programs Office.

In other news, Senate Democrats are committed to assisting the Trump regime.

This morning, Senate Energy ranking member Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) expressed his “substantial reservations” about Trump’s lawless destruction of the planet, which is why he voted to faciliate Trump nominees, including Republican operative and oil lobbyist Leslie Shockley Beyer to be Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Lands and Mineral Management, Andrea Travnicek to be Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Water and Science, and Theodore Garrish to be Assistant Secretary of Energy for Nuclear Energy. (Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) supported the same three by proxy.) Heinrich’s votes sped up the business meeting, as Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) was late and a majority needed to be present to support the nominations. Heinrich did not back Tristan Abbey to be Administrator of the Energy Information Administration, but Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) did. 

Heinrich also wrote a sternly wordly letter that he finds the DOGE takeover of Interior “extremely troubling,” though, again, not enough to stop facilitating Trump’s Interior picks.

Senate Democrats are also doing the Schumer Schuffle to back the GENIUS Act, a corrupt crypto giveaway supported by the crypto-pilled Gallego, Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.), and Kristen Gillibrand (D-N.Y.). To be clear, what they love about crypto is the tens of millions of dollars in dark money crypto grifters have been willing to spend on electing compliant Democratic politicians. And as DSCC chair, raising sacks of cash is one of Gillibrand’s top priorities. For some reason, they think the money spigot will keep flowing after the industry gets what it needs out of the dying Democrats.

Trump’s wildly corrupt billion-dollar crypto-coin scam is super inconvenient for the Democrats who want to help their crypto-scammer friends. So they’re going to the same Schumer playbook they used to painful embarrassment on the Trump continuing resolution—they’re dropping the filibuster, their only leverage, in “exchange” for a meaningless vote on amendments which will fail. This time, a meaningless amendment is coming from Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and is being promoted by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).

Pretty embarrassing.

Finally, a word from our sponsor, Poop From A Butthole:

On Tuesday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. visited downtown Washington’s Cucina Morini. And then:

Hearings on the Hill:

• 9:30 AM: Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
  Votes on Nominations of Andrea Travnicek, Leslie Beyer, Theodore Garrish, and Tristan Abbey

• 10 AM: Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
  Nominations of William Doffermyre to be Solicitor of Interior, Catherine Jereza to be Assistant Secretary of Energy for Electricity, Kyle Haustveit to be Assistant Secretary of Energy for Fossil Energy

• 10 AM: Senate Appropriations Committee
     Homeland Security Subcommittee
  A Review of the President's Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Request for the Department of Homeland Security

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