EPA Sued for Illegal Propaganda by Federal Agency

EPA Sued for Illegal Propaganda by Federal Agency

Posted on Thursday, Jun 29th, 2017
EPA Sued for Illegal Propaganda by Federal Agency
Judicial Watch has filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for all records related to the EPA’s use of the Thunderclap social media platform. Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit on June 21 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (Judicial Watch vs. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (No. 1:17-cv-01218)).

The suit was filed after EPA failed to respond to a May 3, 2017, FOIA request seeking:

All internal emails or other records concerning project administration, management, or assignment of tasks related to the EPA’s use of the Thunderclap social media platform.

A December 2015 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report concluded the EPA’s use of Thunderclap to send out messages boosting the Waters of the United States rule (also known as the Clean Water Rule) “constitutes covert propaganda” and violates the legal prohibition on propaganda by a federal agency.

The GAO report found that the EPA reached 1.8 million social media users through Thunderclap, which uses a synchronized social media blast to amplify a message on platforms such as Twitter:

 

Read more: https://www.ammoland.com/2017/06/judicial-watch-sues-epa-violating-prohi...