May, 24 2016, 11:00am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
State Dept. Emails: How Clinton Pushed Fracking
Fracking promises to be an issue in the upcoming Democratic Party presidential primaries, including California and New Mexico. See accuracy.org/calendar for upcoming events.
Fracking promises to be an issue in the upcoming Democratic Party presidential primaries, including California and New Mexico. See accuracy.org/calendar for upcoming events.
STEVE HORN, steve at desmogblog.com, @SteveAHorn
Horn just co-wrote the piece, "Hillary Clinton's Energy Initiative Pressed Countries to Embrace Fracking, New Emails Reveal," for The Intercept. He is an independent investigative journalist and research fellow with DeSmogBlog.
The piece states: "Back in April, just before the New York primary, Hillary Clinton's campaign aired a commercial on upstate television stations touting her work as secretary of state forcing 'China, India, some of the world's worst polluters' to make 'real change.' She promised to 'stand firm with New Yorkers opposing fracking, giving communities the right to say "no."'
"The television spot, which was not announced and does not appear on the official campaign YouTube page with most of Clinton's other ads, implied a history of opposition to fracking, here and abroad. But emails obtained by The Intercept from the Department of State reveal new details of behind-the-scenes efforts by Clinton and her close aides to export American-style hydraulic fracturing -- the horizontal drilling technique best known as fracking -- to countries all over the world. ...
"The Global Shale Gas Initiative, Clinton's program for promoting fracking, was announced on April 7, 2010, by David Goldwyn, the State Department's special envoy for energy affairs, at the United States Energy Association (USEA), whose members include Chevron, ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, and Shell. ...
"Goldwyn emphasized that the shale gas initiative was not designed to help the private sector and instead should be seen as 'a really very modest government-to-government.'
"But the emails show an aggressive effort to engage private energy companies and use Poland as part of a larger campaign to sell fracking throughout the region.
"An email dated December 3, 2010, shows that the State Department had Poland firmly in its bull's-eye and that companies such as ExxonMobil, Chevron, Marathon Oil, Canadian firm BNK Petroleum and Italian energy company Eni expressed interest in tapping into Polish shale."
A nationwide consortium, the Institute for Public Accuracy (IPA) represents an unprecedented effort to bring other voices to the mass-media table often dominated by a few major think tanks. IPA works to broaden public discourse in mainstream media, while building communication with alternative media outlets and grassroots activists.
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