WIKIMEDIA, JONATHAN BILLINGERInstead of “climate change,” staff at the US Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) were told to use the term “weather extremes,” according to agency emails described by The Guardian yesterday (August 7). The director of soil health, Bianca Moebius-Clune, also wrote in the February correspondence that “build soil organic matter” should replace “reduce greenhouse gases” and “sequester carbon.”
The news report suggested these were political moves to fall in line with the newly installed Trump administration. Jimmy Bramblett, deputy chief for programs at the NRCS, said in a January email to senior staff: “It has become clear one of the previous administration’s priority [sic] is not consistent with that of the incoming administration. Namely, that priority is climate change. Please visit with your staff and make them aware of this shift in perspective within the executive branch.”
Kaveh Sadeghzadeh, NRCS’s communications director, tells The Huffington Post, “these emails, sent in the first days of the new Administration, did not reflect the direction of senior agency leadership.” He says his department “has not received direction from USDA or the Administration to modify its communications ...
