Justice Connection board member Andrew Mergen issued the following statement on the Justice Department’s decision to change the Environment and Natural Resources Division’s name to the Energy and Natural Resources Division:
“ENRD’s work has long been understood to protect the public interest in the environment and natural resources. While ENRD has also always played a significant role in the legal defense of energy development, to rebrand the division as the ‘Energy Division’ is truly a misnomer.
“DOJ possesses only a piece of the energy docket in federal court: the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Bonneville Power Administration all have independent litigating authority and thus all have a substantial role in the energy litigation landscape.
“ENRD and the U.S. Attorney’s Offices it partners with, however, are the only government litigators enforcing environmental laws. If you want the public to know what the division does you need ‘environment’ in its name.
“The name change is best understood not as serving the public, for whom the department works, but instead as catering to the priorities of the President and an Administration that has cynically invoked ‘national security’ and so-called energy ‘emergencies’ to evade compliance with environmental laws.
“I worked for the division for three decades. During that time, I defended countless fossil fuel projects. In none of those cases did the agency rely on ‘national security’ or emergency exemptions from environmental law. Notably, I also worked on the defense of numerous solar, wind, and geothermal projects intended to cut greenhouse gases and to give American consumers access to cheaper sources of electricity.
“This Administration, on the other hand, continues to wage war on clean and affordable energy to the detriment of the American public.”
