OPINION:
In November, the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, led by Rep. James Comer, issued a letter to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan. That letter stated that some EPA policy changes appeared to “entrench the status quo without regard to scientific advances while enhancing the power of the unelected federal officials to influence or stymie policy decisions.”
This letter was motivated by policy changes in early 2024 to the agency’s “scientific integrity” policies. The EPA and other science-based executive agencies in the federal government moved toward banning “political” policymaking. In President Biden’s last days, the EPA took another step in that direction.
Agencies have had scientific integrity policies since the late 1990s. Historically, these policies have aimed at maintaining specific standards and procedures for science-based policymaking. The goal was to have work performed with “objectivity, without predetermined outcomes” and to “represent [findings] fairly and accurately.”
Under the Biden administration, these policies began to take a different shape. In 2021, Mr. Biden issued a memorandum directing executive agencies to develop policies that identify “deviations from existing policies [that] have resulted in improper political interference in the conduct of scientific research.” Mr. Biden stated, “Scientific findings should never be distorted or influenced by political considerations.”
Indeed, science should not be political, but what is “political” is arbitrary. Who determines what is “political” and what is outside-the-box thinking?
It is dangerous, in fact unscientific, to ban science that deviates in its theories or conclusions from the scientific community’s consensus. There were different theories regarding the handling of COVID-19 and different theories on what causes climate change. Executive agencies should be able to test and evaluate all theories as long as the methods are proper and the conclusions are drawn from unbiased data.
Unfortunately, the federal government agencies heeded Mr. Biden’s call and adopted these changes to their scientific integrity policies. The Office of Science and Technology Policy developed the footprint, stating that science must be free of “political interference or inappropriate influence.” This includes “the design, proposal, conduct management, evaluation, reporting and use of scientific data.” Under this policy, one cannot even create a study to test an alternative theory.
Many agencies, including the EPA, used the Office of Science and Technology Policy changes as a springboard to their scientific integrity amendments. The EPA’s changes explicitly prevent agency leadership from directing policy elements deemed “political.” The EPA also expanded the applicability of this policy to an “economic analysis,” meaning that weighing costs against science can be deemed “political.”
Taking things a step further, the EPA included this version of the scientific integrity policy in its union contract. Knowing President Trump’s leadership could reverse these policies, the EPA cemented them into a binding contract. Additionally, it gave the employees the power to file grievances against agency leadership. This means agency scientists can effectively direct policy within the EPA, and if their politically appointed superior says differently, they can file a grievance. Insubordination is now official policy.
This system seems absurd and goes against the principles of democracy and the Constitution. The people elect a president, who, in turn, has the constitutional right under the appointments clause to appoint people to direct policy within the executive agencies. If kept in place, these policies effectively prevent his leadership from doing the job that the Constitution grants.
Mr. Comer’s letter to Mr. Regan noted the questionable policy and the union contract. Mr. Regan was on notice about the problematic nature of these policies. Despite that, on Jan. 7, 2015, just weeks before Mr. Trump was set to take office, the EPA and its inspector general’s office pushed this backward system even further. Now, an appointed “scientific integrity official” will “promptly report any scientific integrity concern of political interference by senior agency employees to the EPA OIG Hotline.” They have set up a Big Brother of sorts to keep an eye on Mr. Trump’s leadership.
The “scientific integrity” policies have become what they purport to ban: politically motivated activity. They are motivated purely toward political decisions that the Biden administration does not like and predicated on the tacit assumption that the EPA’s career employees don’t like them either. The resistance to Mr. Trump and the electoral majority that sent him back to the White House should not be tolerated. Mr. Trump should vacate these policies because they are unconstitutional. Congress should also probe further into this matter. Scientific integrity policies should be only about science, not politics.
• Curtis Schube is executive director for Council to Modernize Governance, a think tank committed to making government administration more efficient, representative and restrained. He is a former constitutional and administrative law lawyer.
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