The Washington Post - USA (2022-02-22)

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

Politics & the Nation

ALABAMA

Death row inmate who

sought new trial dies

An Alabama death row inmate
who maintained his innocence
and waged a high-profile but
unsuccessful legal battle to
overturn his conviction has died,
according to a spokesperson for
his legal team.
William Ernest Kuenzel, 60,
died Saturday at Holman
Correctional Facility after a battle
with cancer, according to a
spokesperson for his legal team.

The Alabama Department of

Corrections did not immediately

respond to an email seeking

comment.

Kuenzel was convicted in 1988

of killing Linda Jean Offord

during a 1987 robbery at a

convenience store in the eastern

Alabama city of Sylacauga. His

conviction was based largely on

plea deal testimony from his

roommate, who admitted being

at the crime scene but said it was

Kuenzel who went into the store

and killed the clerk.

Kuenzel’s lawyers said they

later discovered evidence that

cast doubt on the witness and

plea deal testimony but said

those claims never had a full

review because of the technicality

of a missed deadline. The U.S.

Supreme Court in 2016 refused to

review Kuenzel’s case.

Kuenzel lawyers said they

found out decades after the

conviction that a teenage witness

— who testified she saw both men

at the convenience store —

initially told a grand jury that she

wasn’t certain whom she saw.

Defense lawyers said they also

learned that the roommate, who

had blood on his pants after the

murder, had a shotgun of the

same gauge used to kill Offord,

and had injuries.

The case drew several

prominent supporters. Former

U.S. attorney general Edwin

Meese, who served under

President Ronald Reagan, urged

the U.S. Supreme Court to hear

the case to “ensure that the

compelling constitutional claims

of a man who is very likely

actually innocent are resolved on

the merits.” Actor Sam Waterston

made a video for a website

supporting Kuenzel’s innocence.

— Associated Press

ARIZONA

Border Patrol agent

kills man on trail

Federal and local authorities

are investigating the death of a

man who was shot by a U.S.

Border Patrol agent late Saturday

a few miles north of the Mexico

border outside the Arizona town

of Douglas.

U.S. Customs and Border

Protection area spokesman John

Mennell confirmed Monday that

the agency was investigating with

the Cochise County sheriff’s

office, and that Mexican

Consulate officials were notified

of the death in the Skeleton

Canyon area of the Peloncillo

Mountains.

The shooting was reported

about 10 p.m. Saturday in

“difficult terrain” on East

Geronimo Trail, about 30 miles

east of Douglas, the sheriff’s

office said.

Other people in the area were

detained and taken to a Border

Patrol station “for interview

purposes and further processing,”

the sheriff’s office said.

— Associated Press

DIGEST

BY MAXINE JOSELOW

A recent court ruling that bars
the Biden administration from
accounting for the real-world
costs of climate change has creat-
ed temporary chaos at federal
agencies, upending everything
from planned oil and gas lease
sales to infrastructure spending.
The Feb. 11 decision by a Loui-
siana federal judge blocked the
Biden administration from using
a higher estimate for the damage
that each additional ton of green-
house gas pollution causes soci-
ety. T his formula, called the social
cost of carbon, applies to conse-
quential decisions affecting fossil
fuel extraction on public lands,
infrastructure projects and even
international climate talks.
The Justice Department said it
intends to appeal the Louisiana
judge’s preliminary injunction.
But in the meantime, the ruling
could set off a scramble at federal
agencies to redo their analyses of
major decisions that relied on the
higher social cost of carbon, a top
Biden administration official
warned in a brief filed Saturday.
“I understand that a significant
number of agency rules and ac-
tions would need to be postponed
or reworked as a result of the
Preliminary Injunction,” wrote
Dominic J. Mancini, deputy ad-
ministrator of the Office of Infor-
mation and Regulatory Affairs of
the Office of Management and
Budget.
“The cumulative burden of the
Preliminary Injunction is quite
significant,” he added. “Regulato-
ry impact analyses and analyses
in support of other agency ac-
tions are often very complex and
time-intensive studies that agen-
cies can spend months develop-
ing and refining.”
Mancini noted that the Energy
Department had identified
21 rulemakings that would be af-
fected by the ruling, while the
Environmental Protection Agen-
cy had identified five and the
Interior Department had pin-
pointed three. In addition, he
said, Transportation Department
officials had expressed concern
about the potential for months-
long delays to a grant program for
rail and transit projects.
President Biden last year di-
rected federal agencies to apply

an interim social cost of carbon of

$51 per ton — the figure used

under Barack Obama — while his

administration weighed whether

to raise it to as high as $125 per

ton. Under Donald Trump, that

figure had fallen as low as $1 per

ton, as his appointees recalculat-

ed the impacts of climate change

on present and future genera-

tions.

But a coalition of 10 Republi-

can attorneys general sued over

the presidential directive, argu-

ing that Biden lacked the authori-

ty to raise the climate metric

under the Constitution, which

gives that power solely to Con-

gress. The Louisiana federal

judge, a Trump appointee,

agreed.

The libertarian Competitive

Enterprise Institute, which has

consistently opposed limits on

greenhouse gas emissions, cited

the ruling in calling on the EPA to

rescind its new tailpipe standards

for cars and light trucks.

One of the ruling’s most con-

troversial — and largely unfore-

seen — consequences involves the

Interior Department’s plans to

auction off public lands to oil and

gas drilling as required by the

Mineral Leasing Act of 1920.

Officials used the higher inter-

im social cost of carbon in the

environmental analysis under-

pinning an auction of 179,00 1

acres of public lands in Wyoming.

As a result, Interior last week

missed the statutory deadline to

announce the sales in the first

quarter of this year, prompting

criticism from the oil industry

and Republicans on Capitol Hill.

“Even in the face of a global

energy crisis, historic inflation,

and skyrocketing gasoline prices,

the Biden administration contin-

ues to crush U.S. energy produc-

tion,” Sen. John Barrasso (Wyo.),

the top Republican on the Energy

and Natural Resources Commit-

tee, said in a statement.

Kevin O’Scannlain, vice presi-

dent of upstream policy at the

American Petroleum Institute,

said in an email that the Interior

Department’s lapse in leasing an-

nouncements “not only violates

its statutory obligations, but also

complicates efforts to address ris-

ing energy costs and ensure our

European allies have a stable sup-

ply of energy.”

Interior spokeswoman Melissa

Schwartz said in a statement that

“delays are expected in permit-

ting and leasing for the oil and gas

programs” as a result of the rul-

ing. She said the agency is “com-

mitted to ensuring its programs

account for climate impacts.”

In an ironic twist, Republican-

led states had argued in their

lawsuit that the higher social cost

of carbon would hamper fossil

fuel production on federal lands,

including in Wyoming.

The lawsuit was spearheaded

by Louisiana Attorney General

Jeff Landry (R), a vocal advocate

for the oil and gas industry who

criticized Obama as “anti-oil” in a

2012 interview. Wyoming Attor-

ney General Bridget Hill (R),

whose state leads the nation in

natural gas production on public

lands, joined the complaint.

The ruling could also have un-

foreseen consequences for inter-

national climate diplomacy, ac-

cording to Mancini, the White

House regulatory official.

“The United States has dozens

of bilateral agreements on sci-

ence and technology with key

foreign partners, like Germany,

and holds regular discussions

with countries on the science,

technology, and economics of cli-

mate change and energy policy,”

Mancini wrote. “The Preliminary

Injunction threatens to curtail

what materials the federal gov-

ernment can rely upon in prepar-

ing for such meetings and has the

potential to undercut the federal

government’s ability to fully en-

gage in international dialogues

and to advocate for U.S. interests

in discussions of climate eco-

nomics and related topics.”

Richard Revesz, who directs

the Institute for Policy Integrity

at t he New York University School

of Law, said the Louisiana judge’s

decision was “one of the most

aggressive and ill-founded ad-

ministrative law opinions” that

he has read in recent years.

Revesz called it “unprecedent-

ed” for a judge to intervene so

early in the rulemaking process to

tell the government it cannot

study a potential risk.

“I don’t know how a court

could tell a president that the

executive branch cannot estimate

the harm of a pollutant,” he said.

“It’s like saying, ‘I’m sorry, the

executive branch cannot study

whether something is a carcino-

gen.’ ”

Jesse Prentice-Dunn, policy di-

rector at the Center for Western

Priorities, an environmental

group, said the Louisiana judge’s

ruling put Interior in an impossi-

ble position when it comes to oil

and gas lease sales.

If Interior held a lease sale

based on the current environ-

mental analysis, Prentice-Dunn

said, it could get struck down in

court for relying on the higher

interim social cost of carbon. But

if the department held a lease sale

based on a new environmental

analysis without the metric, it

could get invalidated for failing to

consider the climate impacts of

drilling on public lands.

“Right now the Interior De-

partment is facing a legal mine-

field,” he said. “It’s kind of

damned if you do, damned if you

don’t.”

Anna Phillips contributed to this

report.

Judge bars Biden administration from weighing climate costs in decisions

ANDREW CULLEN/REUTERS

A natural gas flare on an oil well pad burns as the sun sets outside Watford City, N.D., in 2016. Interior Department sales of oil and gas

leases are up in the air after a judge’s ruling blocking the Biden administration from factoring climate change into regulatory decisions.

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