AP stands by story on Superfund sites near Houston

The Associated Press issued a statement Sunday stating that it stands by its story regarding Superfund sites near Houston despite criticism from the government agency.

Executive editor Sally Buzbee issued a statement Sunday evening:

Tom McKay of Gizmodo noted that the Environmental Protection Agency posted a statement on its website — which it later took down — criticizing the reporters who wrote the story, including environment and energy reporter Michael Biesecker.

McKay reported, “In a followup statement, EPA Associate Administrator Liz Bowman claimed the AP was ‘once again’ attempting to ‘mislead Americans’ by ‘cherry-picking facts,’ and slammed the report as ‘yellow journalism.’ The statement also links to far-right website Breitbart, one of the president’s favorite websites.

“Since the EPA did not actually contest any of the facts in the AP article, this looks an awful lot like petty retaliation against journalists for having the temerity to report on things like the EPA’s response to an environmental catastrophe — or any number of other things, like Pruitt’s extremely sketchy ties to the climate change denial movement, war on environmental science or plans to eliminate huge numbers of EPA staff.”

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