Exhibit 862 ยท Legal decision
Environmental Protection Agency - Application of Publicity or Propaganda and Anti-Lobbying Provisions, B-326944
EPA's use of Thunderclap constituted covert propaganda, in violation of the publicity or propaganda prohibition.
Requested by Sen. Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Finds that EPA's Thunderclap campaign during the 'Waters of the United States' rulemaking was covert propaganda, that two other campaigns (#DitchtheMyth, #CleanWaterRules) did not violate the prohibition, that hyperlinks in an EPA blog post to NRDC and Surfrider pages were grassroots lobbying, and that EPA violated the Antideficiency Act. EPA argued it made no attempt to conceal its role.
- Source
- U.S. Government Accountability Office
- Date
- 14 December 2015
- Quoted from
- Opinion, p. 11
- Grade
- Primary record
- Document
- https://www.gao.gov/products/b-326944
- Archived
- https://web.archive.org/web/2020/https://www.gao.gov/assets/b-326944.pdf
- Accessed
- 2026-11-09
- Cited by
- Findings citing this exhibit