For Immediate Release:
February 18, 2015

Contact:
Craig Richardson
[email protected]
202-758-8301

– MEDIA ADVISORY-

Transparency Attorney Chris Horner, Whose Request into the Washington State Governor’s Office Uncovered E-mails Linked to Kitzhaber-Green Group Scandal, Available to Discuss His Findings

What: Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal) Senior Legal Fellow and well-known FOIA attorney, Chris Horner, who filed a FOIA request with the Washington State Governor’s Office that resulted in the release of e-mails linked to the Kitzhaber-green groups scandal.

When: Immediately

Where: Telephone & Skype interviews, in-studio or remote link-up in the Washington, D.C.-area

Who: Attorney and Senior Legal Fellow Chris Horner, who filed the FOIA request.

In September 2014, E&E Legal Senior Legal Fellow filed a FOIA request with the Washington State Office of the Governor seeking e-mails and other documents mentioning billionaire environmental extremist Tom Styer; Kate Gordon, Senior Vice President & Director, Energy & Climate Program for Next Generation; NextGen Climate; and the Washington League of Conservation Voters. In December 2014, the Washington State Governor’s Office released a substantial production of e-mails, including a remarkable thread, which Horner analyzed in an Op-Ed appearing in today’s Washington Times.

Horner writes “On behalf of the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, I obtained an 11-page email thread under Washington State’s freedom of information law. In it, we see how Mr. Kitzhaber’s office organized a campaign to promote the industry’s agenda, beginning with the California and Washington governors’ offices, a private environmentalist law firm and the White House.”

Columnist John Fund also covered the story yesterday for National Review Online, and he said: “Chris Horner, of the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, used Freedom of Information Act requests to unearth a ten-page 2013 e-mail thread from the Washington governor’s office to allies working in various other governors’ offices. The thrust was advice on how to launch ‘a nationally coordinated, multi-year ‘states strategy’ focused on driving outcomes contemplated by the president’s climate action plan,’ to ‘spread climate coordination and collaboration.'”

In addition to his National reputation as a leading transparency attorney, Horner has written on numerous topics in publications ranging from law reviews to legal and industrial trade journals to print and online opinion pages, and is the author of three best-selling books: Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America (Regnery, 2010); Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed (Regnery, 2008) and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism (Regnery, 2007), which spent half of 2007 on the New York Times bestseller list; and his most recent, The Liberal War on Transparency: Confessions of a Freedom of Information ‘Criminal” (Threshold). He received his Juris Doctorate from Washington University in St. Louis where he received the Judge Samuel Breckenridge Award for Advocacy.

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The Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal) is a 501(c)(3) organization engaged in strategic litigation, policy research, and public education on important energy and environmental issues. Primarily through its petition litigation and transparency practice areas, E&E Legal seeks to correct onerous federal and state policies that hinder the economy, increase the cost of energy, eliminate jobs, and do little or nothing to improve the environment.

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