December 15, 2015

GAO: EPA broke law promoting water rule on social media

The Environmental Protection Agency broke the law by using social media to promote the Waters of the United States regulation, according to a government watchdog.

The Government Accountability Office made the accusation in a letter sent to Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., Monday afternoon. The investigators ruled that the use of Thunderclap, a "crowd speaking platform" that helps a single message be shared across multiple social media platforms at once, was "covert propaganda."

"We conclude that EPA's use of Thunderclap constituted covert propaganda, in violation of the publicity or propaganda prohibition," the letter said.

The EPA created a Thunderclap page titled "I Choose Clean Water," the letter said. When the page gained 500 supporters, it posted a message to all of those supporters' social media accounts. It is estimated the post reached 1.8 million people on social media.

Read the entire article

No comments:

Post a Comment