Trump Hires Scientists Who Doubt the Consensus on Climate Change

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: New York Times

Trump Hires Scientists Who Doubt the Consensus on Climate Change

The three scientists joined the administration after it dismissed hundreds of experts who were assessing how global warming is affecting the country.

July 8, 2025 Updated 2:47 p.m. ET


Steven E. Koonin, a physicist and author, was hired by the Energy Department. He previously worked as a physicist at New York University, as a scientist for the oil and gas company BP and as an under secretary at the Energy Department during the Obama administration.Aaron M. Sprecher/Bloomberg

The Energy Department has hired at least three scientists who are well-known for their rejection of the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change, according to records reviewed by The New York Times. ... The scientists are listed in the Energy Department’s internal email system as current employees of the agency, the records show. They are Steven E. Koonin, a physicist and author of a best-selling book that calls climate science “unsettled”; John Christy, an atmospheric scientist who doubts the extent to which human activity has caused global warming; and Roy Spencer, a meteorologist who believes that clouds have had a greater influence on warming than humans have.

Their hiring comes after the Trump administration dismissed hundreds of scientists and experts who had been compiling the federal government’s flagship report on how climate change is affecting the country. The administration has also systematically removed mentions of climate change from government websites while slashing federal funding for research on global warming. ... In addition, Trump officials have been recruiting scientists to help them repeal the 2009 “endangerment finding,” which determined that greenhouse gases pose a threat to public health and welfare, and which now underpins much of the government’s legal authority to slow global warming, according to two people briefed on the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

It was not immediately clear what the three scientists were working on or whether they were being paid. Representatives for Dr. Koonin, Dr. Spencer and the Energy Department did not respond to requests for comment. ...In a brief phone interview and follow-up email, Dr. Christy said he was not working on the endangerment finding nor collecting a government salary. He declined to comment further.

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Now, Dr. Koonin is listed as a “special government employee” in the Energy Department’s internal email system, the records show. Federal law says special government employees are executive branch appointees named to “perform important, but limited, services to the government, with or without compensation, for a period not to exceed 130 days” during a one-year period. Elon Musk had that classification when he began Mr. Trump’s cost cutting initiative, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. ... Dr. Koonin also serves as a fellow at the Hoover Institution, a conservative-leaning research organization on Stanford University’s campus. He previously worked as a physicist at New York University, a scientist for the oil and gas company BP and an under secretary at the Energy Department during the Obama administration.

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Brad Plumer contributed reporting from Washington.

Maxine Joselow reports on climate policy for The Times.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/climate/trump-climate-energy-department.html

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Hat tip, Joe.My.God.

https://www.joemygod.com/2025/07/energy-dept-hires-three-climate-change-deniers/