Papers bearing the presidential seal appear on climate contrarian websites but were not authorized

By Andrew Freedman and Jason Samenow, Washington Post

Controversial papers questioning the seriousness of climate change led by David Legates, a senior official at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration appointed by President Trump, have been published online without White House approval.

The papers, which were published on nongovernment websites, bear the imprint of the Executive Office of the President and state they were copyrighted by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). But they were disavowed.

“These papers were not created at the direction of The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy nor were they cleared or approved by OSTP leadership,” OSTP spokeswoman Kristina Baum said in an email Monday night.

Reached by phone Tuesday, she added that “OSTP has no intention to formalize these,” and said that they are being dealt with internally.

The papers make controversial and disputed claims about climate science, including that human-caused global warming “involves a large measure of faith” and that computer models are “too small and slow” to produce meaningful climate simulations.

Legates did not reply to requests for comment regarding why the papers were published bearing the seal of the Executive Office of the President when they were not approved.

“These misguided and thoroughly erroneous screeds would not have been issued by any body with a shred of scientific integrity,” wrote John Holdren, who was the OSTP director under President Obama. “It is not enough for an offense of this magnitude to be disavowed by an OSTP spokesperson. It should be forcefully denounced by the OSTP Director, Dr. Kelvin Droegemeier.”

Holdren also called for Legates to be fired.

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