Home 9 The Newsroom 9 News Clips ( Page 5 )

Federal workers reeling over Trump’s ‘buyout’ offer: ‘This is the last lifeboat in town’

by Politico | January 30, 2025
Tim Whitehouse, the executive director at the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit that provides legal services to federal workers, said he had been fielding calls on the resignation request since it became public. “The employees we are speaking to view this ...

Watchdog Group Issues Stark Warning for U.S. National Parks

by Fodor's Travel | January 30, 2025
Data released by the National Park Service (NPS) last summer was included in a report by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) that indicates ranger staffing in National Parks is already at its lowest level this century. In 2024, there were 1,200 park rangers across the ...

EPA employees told to pause most external communications and cancel meetings with outside parties

by Government Executive | January 29, 2025
Tim Whitehouse, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility said the communications pause and other Trump administration actions affecting the federal workforce writ large would benefit corporations and individuals who oppose environmental enforcement. “ ...

Maryland’s Renewable Energy Program: More Smoke and Mirrors Than Wind and Solar, New Report Alleges

by Inside Climate News | January 29, 2025
Instead, it has stalled the growth of Maryland’s renewable energy sector, undermined the transition to fossil-free electricity and funneled billions in public subsidies to out-of-state energy producers with significant consequences for the environment and ratepayers, according to the ...

‘Paranoia and distrust’: How Trump’s mass firing of government watchdogs will affect climate policy

by Grist | January 29, 2025
“All of the checks and balances have been stripped,” said Kyla Bennett, Northeast and Mid-Atlantic director for Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a group that offers pro bono assistance to whistleblowers within federal agencies. Federal employees, she added, “can’t ...

Lawsuit Challenges Trump Administration’s Effort To Wipe Out Civil Service Protections

by National Parks Traveler | January 28, 2025
President Trump’s move to eliminate civil service protections for a wide number of federal employees was challenged in federal court Tuesday by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which maintained the effort exceeds the president’s authority. Under the president ...

Get ready for a dizzying debate on energy policy

by Maryland Matters | January 27, 2025
A study released last week from a national government watchdog group, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, suggested that design flaws in the RPS “are undermining the state’s transition to clean electricity and imposing significant costs on Maryland ratepayers.” ...

Trump administration targets wide range of positions for removing federal job protections

by Federal News Network | January 27, 2025
Critics of the Trump administration’s efforts, though, said the executive order is an attempt to politicize the career federal workforce. Many have said it will ultimately harm the non-partisan nature of agencies and threaten national security. “These moves are designed to weaken the ...

Sewage fertilizer poses health risks, EPA warns. What does that mean for North Texas?

by Fort Worth Report | January 27, 2025
Watchdog nonprofit organization Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility assisted Ames’s office with the testing and analysis of Synagro’s fertilizer. On behalf of the affected farmers in Johnson County, the nonprofit filed a civil lawsuit against the EPA, alleging the agency ...

Weaker cleanup standards feared

by Simi Valley Acorn | January 25, 2025
Environmental and public health advocacy groups, including Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, Parents Against SSFL, Physicians for Social Responsibility-Los Angeles Chapter, and the Committee to Bridge the Gap, condemned DOE’s proposed changes. They argue that weaker ...

Wilderness, The Last Frontier

by National Parks Traveler | January 24, 2025
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a group that supports “current and former public employees who seek a higher standard of environmental ethics and scientific integrity within their agencies,” lists 17 “orphaned” areas in the National Park System ...

Trump boosts political control over top-tier federal workers

by E&E News | January 24, 2025
Likewise, Peter Jenkins, senior counsel at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, called Trump’s move “mean-spirited” and a “power grab” by the president that “will be counter-productive for the effectiveness of the nation’s top career civil servants.” Jenkins ...

Trump puts industry insiders in charge of overseeing chemical safety

by The Washington Post | January 23, 2025
Beck will be joined by Dekleva, who also previously worked for the American Chemistry Council and DuPont and will serve as the deputy assistant administrator. Dekleva did not respond to a request for comment. Kyla Bennett, the director of science policy at Public Employees for ...

Trump declared a “national energy emergency.” Experts say it’s a “farce”

by Salon | January 22, 2025
Dr. Kyla Bennett, the director of science policy for the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), told Salon that there is an inextricable link between the science of climate change and the economics of rising prices. “Higher temperatures, floods and droughts — all ...

Alaska Is Set to Kill Hundreds of Bears and Wolves With Aerial Gunning

by Vice | January 21, 2025
The renewed program would permit hunters to kill up to 80 percent of the wolf and black bear populations along with 60 percent of brown bears, The Guardian reported. This polarizing practice is intended to help increase the number of caribou and moose in Alaska. Proponents of aerial ...

Alaska to resume ‘barbaric’ shooting of bears and wolves from helicopters

by The Guardian | January 20, 2025
“The amount of tourist dollars from people seeking to view these predators in the wild dwarfs any incremental increase in hunting fee revenue the state hopes to realize,” said Peer executive director Tim Whitehouse. Read the PEER Story… ...

Trump Targeted Scientists in His First Term. This Time, They’re Prepared.

by New York Times | January 17, 2025
“The inspector generals have provided a much better avenue for serious inquiries into scientific integrity violations because they actually have investigatory powers and they’re not afraid to take on political leaders,” said Tim Whitehouse, executive director of Public Employees for ...

EPA aims to safeguard scientists from political interference

by E&E News | January 16, 2025
The final update arrives almost a year after EPA released a draft that was roundly criticized by organizations like Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a watchdog group. In a Thursday interview, Kyla Bennett, the group’s science policy adviser, said the final version was ...

What to Know About ‘Forever Chemicals’ in Sludge Fertilizer

by New York Times | January 14, 2025
Some states have started to take their own measures. Maine, in particular, banned the use of sewage sludge on agricultural fields in 2022 and remains the only state to have done so. Still, an outright ban on the use of sludge as fertilizer would bring its own problems. Wastewater sludge ...

‘Forever chemicals’ in sewage sludge pose health risks — EPA

by E&E News | January 14, 2025
Kyla Bennett, director of science policy at the nonprofit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said EPA likely underestimated the risks posed by PFAS-laden sewage sludge. She questioned EPA’s assertion that most food produced in the U.S. “is not grown on fields ...
Phone: 202-265-7337

962 Wayne Avenue, Suite 610
Silver Spring, MD 20910-4453

Copyright 2001–2025 Public Employees for
Environmental Responsibility

PEER is a 501(c)(3) organization
EIN: 93-1102740