White House pushed contractors to alter job numbers

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http://times247.com/articles/recordings-contractors-pushed-to-change-job-loss-figure

Obama administration officials may have pressured government contractors to change job loss estimates associated with coal regulations, audio recordings reveal. The tapes show that unnamed officials with the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement asked government contractors to change their calculations of job losses associated with the Stream Protection Rule.

A preliminary draft of an environmental impact statement estimated that up to 7,000 coalminers could lose their jobs under the administration’s “preferred” regulation. After a leaked copy of the report went public, officials asked the contractors to compare job estimates to a model in which another regulation was enforced, rather than the real world numbers. ...

Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio, blasted the administration’s refusal to cooperate with the investigation.

“The tapes validated many of our concerns that the administration went into this with an intent of devastating the coal industry, fully knowing that the provisions in the proposed rule would put 7,000 jobs at risk,” he said. “And they wanted to get away with it by playing pretend.”