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Biden Justice Department Pick Helped Kill Pipeline
President Joe Biden's nominee to lead the Justice Department's civil rights division played a leading role in halting construction of an oil pipeline championed by a lawmaker critical to her confirmation.
Kristen Clarke, already under fire for her past anti-Semitic writings and opposition to civil rights prosecutions of black defendants, helped persuade a federal appeals court to deauthorize an integral part of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Clarke and her advocacy group claimed the project was harmful to black residents.
Regulators and energy companies objected to the claim before mounting legal costs forced them to shut down.
State and federal regulators did not find that the station posed a health threat to nearby populations. Virginia's Department of Environmental Quality found that emissions from the station would be well within prevailing safety standards, even assuming worst-case pollution.
The department's Michael Dowd testified to the control board in January 2019 that the air in Buckingham County would be extremely clean, even when the station is operational.
The residents of the area will continue to breathe air much cleaner than that breathed by the vast majority of Virginia residents," Dowd said. At a subsequent meeting, the board chair noted that his own backyard had higher levels of pollutants than Union Hill would.
President Joe Biden's nominee to lead the Justice Department's civil rights division played a leading role in halting construction of an oil pipeline championed by a lawmaker critical to her confirmation.
Kristen Clarke, already under fire for her past anti-Semitic writings and opposition to civil rights prosecutions of black defendants, helped persuade a federal appeals court to deauthorize an integral part of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Clarke and her advocacy group claimed the project was harmful to black residents.
Regulators and energy companies objected to the claim before mounting legal costs forced them to shut down.
State and federal regulators did not find that the station posed a health threat to nearby populations. Virginia's Department of Environmental Quality found that emissions from the station would be well within prevailing safety standards, even assuming worst-case pollution.
The department's Michael Dowd testified to the control board in January 2019 that the air in Buckingham County would be extremely clean, even when the station is operational.
The residents of the area will continue to breathe air much cleaner than that breathed by the vast majority of Virginia residents," Dowd said. At a subsequent meeting, the board chair noted that his own backyard had higher levels of pollutants than Union Hill would.
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