Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy sparred with Republicans Thursday over whether her agency is guilty of criminal charges in spilling millions of gallons of toxic sludge into the waterways of three western states last month.
House Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop, R-Utah, laid into McCarthy regarding the Aug. 5 Gold King Mine spill, accusing her agency of violating the Endangered Species Act and other laws, which carry criminal and civil penalties.
“We do not believe that we constituted a failure to actually notify concerning endangered species because the actions we were taking were intended to stop a blowout,” McCarthy said. “Clearly, there was a problem at the site. That’s what we’re looking at.”
“I appreciate you making your own interpretation of the law. But that is not what the law requires. And that is not what the law says, period,” Bishop said.
“But the bottom line is your documents say, you anticipated a potential major blowout. And the law says if you anticipate a major blowout, you have to contact [the] Fish and Wildlife [Service],” Bishop added. “And until last night, you did not contact Fish and Wildlife. And there are criminal and civil penalties for violating” those requirements.
“I don’t really care what your goal was … [it] may be noble, [but] it violated the law that you make everyone else live by, you violated. And you’re doing it with impunity,” Bishop said.
McCarthy has faced a deluge of GOP accusations at three oversight hearings in the past 24 hours. The line of questioning has been attempting to probe what her agency knew before it released 3 million gallons of toxic wastewater into the Animas River watershed.
Documents the agency released showed it was warned that a spill was likely at the abandoned mine in Colorado a year before its attempts to actually prevent a spill resulted in one of the most controversial manmade disasters, so far, for 2015.
