The national media can’t seem to understand why EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has a close relationship with a coal executive.
They focus on Pruitt taking premium tickets to a University of Kentucky basketball games from billionaire coal baron Joseph Craft.
Craft runs Alliance Resource Partners, a massive coal company with headquarters in Pruitt’s hometown of Tulsa. Alliance is considered to be the seventh largest coal mining company in the U.S.
The attendance of Pruitt and his son at the game got the attention of The New York Times and other news groups, this as Pruitt’s spending habits have become the focus of several investigations by congress and government agencies.
Those seats were reserved for season ticket holders who contributed $1 million to the University. The EPA responded to the Times story by explaining Pruitt, the former Oklahoma Attorney General paid Craft $130 in cash for each time. A spokesman also indicated that Pruitt and Craft had been “longtime friends.”
In 2013 when Pruitt sought re-election as Attorney General, Craft contributed to the campaign. He also gave $388,550 to the Republican Attorneys General Organization when Pruitt served as its chairman.
So was it a case of simply being “longtime friends” or was it a case of money and friendship influencing Pruitt at the EPA?
The Times reviewed Pruitt’s schedule in his first 14 months at the EPA and found Craft had scheduled to see Pruitt seven times and appear with him two more times. The paper said that’s more than Pruitt has met with any environmental group representatives.