Scientists Feel Political Pressure, Study Finds
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
WASHINGTON — More than half of the scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency who responded to a survey said they have experienced political interference in their work.
The survey results show “an agency under siege from political pressures,” said the Union of Concerned Scientists’ report, which was publicly released yesterday and sent to the EPA administrator, Steve Johnson.
The online questionnaire was sent to 5,419 EPA scientists in summer 2007; 1,586 replied, and of those, 889 reported that they had experienced at least one type of interference within the past five years. Such allegations are not new: During much of the Bush administration, there have been reports of the White House watering down documents regarding climate change and other issues.
