Senate Indian Affairs Chairman John Barrasso (R,-Wyo.) and Vice Chairman John Tester (D.-Mont.) agreed Wednesday to subpoena Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy or a top aide to appear at an upcoming oversight field hearing on the Gold King Mine disaster scheduled for April 22nd in Phoenix. The subpoena - the first issued by the committee since its investigation into the activities of former lobbyist Jack Abramoff in 2004 – included Assistant EPA Administrator Mathy Stanislaus. The committee said Stanislaus was “invited to testify at the field hearing, but the EPA declined to send him.” Barrasso pointed out that during her confirmation hearing, McCarthy “agreed under oath” to appear before congressional committees with oversight authority over her agency. “It troubles me that this committee had to take the extraordinary step of issuing a subpoena to a confirmed federal official,” Barrasso said Wednesday. “During the confirmation process, Gina McCarthy agreed under oath that if confirmed, she would appear before congressional committees with respect to her responsibilities. “She further agreed under oath to ensure testimony in other documents would be provided to congressional committees in a timely manner. "Despite the sworn testimony, the EPA refused to provide any witnesses – any witnesses - to the committee field hearing to be held on April 22, 2016 in Phoenix, Arizona,” Barrasso said. “That hearing would continue our oversight on the EPA’s response to the devastating toxic spill that it had caused, and of the agency’s responsibility to the Indian communities that it had harmed. “I am troubled further that the EPA would disregard such failures and attempt to avoid the responsibility by refusing to appear before the committee and answer questions. "This sort of behavior is unbecoming of any federal official and won’t be tolerated,” he continued. “The subpoena will be served on the EPA later today.” Mike Danylak, the committee’s press secretary, confirmed to CNSNews.com that the subpoenas were served to McCarthy and Stanislaus on Wednesday afternoon, but that as of noon on Friday, the committee had received no response. Last August 5th, EPA released three million gallons of toxic wastewater from the abandoned Gold King Mine, contaminating rivers and streams in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah as well as lands belonging to the Navajo Nation and the Southern Ute Reservation. In a March 16 statement, Navajo Nation president Russell Begaye said that “the Navajo Nation has suffered due to the reckless actions of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and other responsible parties, and the Obama Administration has turned down virtually every request we have made for greater assistance, each time referring us back to the EPA.” On Dec. 9, 2015, following the Department of Interior’s (DOI) “technical evaluation” of the spill, Sec. Sally Jewell told Congress that “we did not see any deliberate attempt to breach a mine. It was an accident.” Jewell also said that “EPA’s trying to do a job of cleaning up a problem it did not create.” However, an investigative report released February 11 by the House Natural Resources Committee “revealed that each of the three reports issued by EPA and DOI in 2015 contains numerous errors and omissions and demonstrably false information… [including the] false claim that the EPA crew was digging high when the plug [sealing the mine] somehow eroded on its own.” CNS News: Senate Committee Subpoenas EPA Over Gold King Mine Disaster http://cnsnews.com/news/article/barbara-hollingsworth/senate-committee-issues-first-subpoena-abramoff-epa-chief-over

• published: 15 Apr 2016
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